A numbered brief
At Geneva in 2000, Piëch announced a 1,001 PS production car capable of more than 400 km/h; the brief also required it to be suitable for an evening drive to the opera.
People
Ferdinand K. Piëch
Volkswagen AG chief executive and driving force behind the Bugatti Veyron 16.4
- Born
- Vienna, 1937
- Died
- Rosenheim, 2019
- Nationality
- Austrian
Wikimedia Commons
The record
Austrian engineer and Volkswagen AG chief executive who secured the rights to the Bugatti brand in 1998 and set the Veyron 16.4’s targets: 1,001 PS, more than 400 km/h, and grand-touring usability.
Born in Vienna on 17 April 1937, Piëch completed a mechanical-engineering diploma at ETH Zurich in 1962 and joined Porsche’s engine-testing department in Stuttgart-Zuffenhausen on 1 April 1963. He became head of testing in 1966 and Head of Development in 1968. He gave the go-ahead for the Porsche 917; Hans Herrmann and Richard Attwood won Le Mans overall in a Porsche Salzburg 917 short-tail in 1970. He left Porsche in 1972.
In 1972, Piëch joined Audi NSU Auto Union in technical development. He became a board member for technical development in 1975 and chairman of the Audi AG board of management in 1988, leaving that post at the end of 1992. Volkswagen AG appointed him to its board on 10 April 1992 and as chairman of the board of management from 1 January 1993. From 16 April 2002 he chaired its supervisory board, resigning all Group mandates on 25 April 2015.
In 1997, Piëch sketched an 18-cylinder engine on a Shinkansen envelope after speaking with Volkswagen powertrain chief Karl-Heinz Neumann. Volkswagen secured Bugatti’s brand rights on 5 May 1998. At Geneva in 2000, Piëch announced a 1,001 PS car capable of more than 400 km/h and usable for an evening journey to the opera. The eventual Veyron 16.4 used a quad-turbo W16; series production began in 2005. He died in Rosenheim on 25 August 2019.
Engine as the centre
The 1997 envelope sketch was a naturally aspirated 18-cylinder built from three VR6 banks. Engineers later chose a quad-turbo W16 built from two VR8s.
Extraordinary or nothing
In his autobiography, Piëch wrote that a concept like Bugatti must not be devalued by mass production and tabloid methods. Bugatti’s 2019 English newsroom rendering says its cars should offer “the extraordinary; the unsurpassed, the optimum.”
The stations
- 1963–1968Porsche KGEngineer, engine testing; head of testing from 1966
- 1968–1972Porsche KGHead of Development; executive board, technology, from 1971
- 1972–1988Audi NSU Auto Union / Audi AGTechnical development; board member for technical development from 1975
- 1988–1992Audi AGChairman of the Board of Management
- 1993–2002Volkswagen AGChairman of the Board of Management
- 2002–2015Volkswagen AGChairman of the Supervisory Board
The house
Credited through Volkswagen Group.
In the register
One file carries this name
The files above are the register's own record of this name. The people index holds everyone the register credits.
In their words
“Bugatti has to always offer the extraordinary; the unsurpassed, the optimum. Only that is Bugatti. On top of the entire automotive world.”
Ferdinand K. Piëch · English rendering in Bugatti Newsroom, 28 August 2019; German original attributed there to Ferdinand Piëch, Auto.Biographie (Hoffmann und Campe, 2002).