In 1998, the then CEO of the Volkswagen group, the German Ferdinand Piëch, decided to buy the Bugatti brand to integrate it into the Volkswagen group under the umbrella of the Porsche subsidiary. Piëch's idea was to buy the brand to manufacture the fastest and most powerful car ever made and he set about the project of the Bugatti Veyron, the first combustion car to exceed 1,001 hp of power and with a top speed of over 400 km/h. In 2016, Bugatti went a step further with the Chiron, an even more beastly and exclusive model, of which it has made exclusive limited series sold at seven-figure prices. However, the Bugatti brand has been far from profitable for several years, despite selling editions of its models that became the most expensive production car in history at the time, as in the case of the Chiron La Voiture Noire, a special unit sold for a final price of over eleven million euros. Despite selling cars at astronomical prices, Bugatti's development, design, production, and marketing costs were higher than the income obtained, and the brand's existence within the Volkswagen group was only explained by a matter of prestige.Since 2021 and for the last five years, the Volkswagen Group has managed Bugatti through its high-performance subsidiary Porsche and an industrial agreement with the Croatian brand Rimac. Rimac is an electric car manufacturer that controls 55% of Bugatti, while Porsche controlled the remaining 45%. However, in turn, the Volkswagen Group controlled 20% of Rimac's shareholding, thus guaranteeing its decision-making power over Bugatti and leveraging the know-how and electric technologies of the Rimac brand, specialized in high-power electric sports cars.An advertised sale

This week Porsche has confirmed the sale of its 45% stake in Bugatti and 20% in Rimac to the North American investment fund HOF Capital, based in New York, for an undisclosed amount. This is due to Porsche's complicated financial situation (a few days ago it announced that it would have to lay off 500 more employees in Germany to balance its accounts), which has led to the sale of its stake in Bugatti when the first serious offer appeared on the brand's management's table.Porsche's electrification strategy has been a mixed success for the German brand, as it has invested heavily in its electric models, such as the Taycan or the new Macan. However, the brand's customers have not yet decided to make the leap to electrification, which has led to a repositioning of the brand's roadmap, which has just announced that it will develop a Macan with a gasoline engine, in a clear move aimed at regaining presence and sales volume in its segment.

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