Prodrive

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Prodrive

logo
legal form Limited
founding 1984
Seat Banbury
management David Richards
sales £ 120 million
Branch Automotive industry
Website www.prodrive.com

Prodrive Ltd. is a British holding company active in both motorsport and engineering.

The Banbury- based company designs and develops sports cars for manufacturers such as Subaru and Aston Martin . Furthermore, Prodrive operates racing teams in various series. The development department in Warwick offers design and development advice to various automobile manufacturers.

Prodrive primarily for the success of the Subaru World Rally Team in the World Rally Championship known. As of the 2011 season , the Mini WRC team will start with a Mini WRC built and supported by Prodrive . At the 2011 Rallye Deutschland , works driver Dani Sordo took third place overall.

In addition to its British homeland, Prodrive has operations in Detroit and California in the United States , Thailand , China and Australia .

In 2007, a consortium led by David Richards and Prodrive took over the sports car manufacturer Aston Martin. With its own Prodrive F1 team , Prodrive also wanted to start the 2008 Formula 1 season , but was rejected by the FIA .

history

In 1984 David Richards and Ian Parry founded Prodrive based on their mutual business activities in the field of racing marketing and consulting. The first racing team operated by Prodrive was the Rothmans Porsche Rallye-Team, which won the Middle East Rally Championship in the first year of its existence and took second place in the European Rally Championship. After further successes in the rally sector with Porsche , MG and BMW , Prodrive expanded into the touring car sector in 1987. The BMW M3 team was overall winner of the British Touring Car Championship in 1988 and class winners in the following two years. Since then, Prodrive has been involved almost continuously in touring car racing, with teams for Alfa Romeo, Honda and Ford in the BTCC and for Volvo in the European Touring Car Championship .

The successful partnership between Prodrive and the Subaru World Rally Team began in 1990, and in 1991 the Scot Colin McRae became British rally champion for the first time with this team. In the same year the company set up an engineering department in order to be able to sell developments to other racing teams and automobile manufacturers. McRae repeated his success in 1992 and won with a Subaru Impreza 1995 , the World Rally Championship .

In 1999 the investment company Apax Partners bought shares of 49% and enabled Prodrive Ltd. such a large financial framework for their expansion plans. The following year the company moved to new premises with its own test track near Warwick. Furthermore, the fifth design engineer title in the BTCC and the third design engineer title in the WTCC could be won this year. 2001 Prodrive GT racing car class expanded, with the self-constructed racing version of the Ferrari 550 Maranello , Prodrive took part in the FIA GT championship . The traditional company Tickford was also taken over this year .

In 2002 Prodrive expanded the engineering department by opening a branch in Germany and founding Prodrive USA. In the same year the name of the joint venture between Prodrive and Ford Australia was changed to Ford Performance Vehicles . In addition, this year Prodrive competed in the Le Mans 24-hour race for the first time . The Prodrive Ferrari could not finish the race, despite being in pole position in the GTS class, but won the race the following year. Also in 2003, Prodrive and Aston Martin agreed to work together to design a GT1 racing version of the DB9 and build a racing team. The Formula 1 team BAR , led by Prodrive from 2001 , was able to record its first podium place with driver Jenson Button and third place in the constructors' championship in 2004 .

In 2005, the Aston Martin DBR9 debuted victoriously in the Sebring 12 Hours, and third place was achieved in the Le Mans 24 Hours. In the spring of 2006, Prodrive presented the Prodrive P2 concept vehicle and signed a partnership agreement with Carver Europe for the design and production of the Carver vehicle . In the same year, Prodrive F1, after many years of efforts, was initially confirmed as the 12th team for the 2008 Formula 1 season , but was ultimately not approved for this season. In addition to successes in the GT class and the V8 supercar , Prodrive started production of the Vandenbrink Carver in 2006 and competed in road rallies with the Aston Martin Rally GT, the first Aston Martin rally vehicle for over 50 years. In 2007, the DBR9 won an Aston Martin for the first time since 1959 at Le Mans in its category; In the same year, a consortium led by David Richards took over the Aston Martin company from Ford. In 2008 Prodrive was able to repeat its success in the GT1 series and developed a limited sports version of the Brera for Alfa Romeo . In the same year the Kuwaiti The Investment Dar Company (TID) bought a 40% stake. In the following year, Prodrive implemented Aston Martin's first sports car project since the Nimrod NRA / C2 together with Lola and Charouz Racing . The car called Lola-Aston Martin LMP1 ran in both the Le Mans Series and the Le Mans 24-hour race. During the Le Mans Prototype in the Le Mans Series 2009 season import the title in the driver and team championship, the LMP1 at Le Mans reached with the fourth overall the best result of a vehicle with a petrol engine.

source

Web link

Individual evidence

  1. Partnership with Prodrive . Carver Europe BV. Archived from the original on October 19, 2007. Retrieved December 9, 2008.