The word is out, Porsche has confirmed: Ferdinand Piëch, the titanic Volkswagen and Porsche alpha figure, is ready to sell his 14.7 percent share in Porsche SE, the holding company that controls Volkswagen. If Piëch isn?t bluffing and the sale happens, it will close the book on the most extraordinary automotive career of the modern era. It also will mark the definitive end of an era that saw VW rise from a lazy, government-influenced maker of mediocre mass-market cars to the automotive world?s most formidable and aspiring powerhouse. Almost all of it was Piëch?s vision and making.
The now 79-year-old father of 12, a grandson of Ferdinand Porsche, graduated from college in 1962 and then joined Porsche, where he worked on the first-generation 911 before its launch. He subsequently was fired because he hedged the company?s fortune on the monstrously powerful 917 race car. The car rewrote automotive and racing history, but the family had had enough. Piëch hadn?t. He joined Audi, launched the five-cylinder engine, and then hired Fritz Indra from BMW Alpina to work on, among other things, the 1980 Quattro, which revolutionized rally racing. He was the driving force and mastermind behind the 5000 with its superior aerodynamics that, in turbo form, was the fastest four-door in the world when it was first launched.
In 1993, Piëch went from Audi to VW. Piëch?s vision, with Audi setting its sights on BMW, was to turn VW into a formidable Mercedes-Benz competitor and pit ?koda ...