[DeTomaso] The New DeTomaso?

larry at ohiotimecorp.com larry at ohiotimecorp.com
Fri Mar 15 10:17:20 EDT 2019


Chuck,

In this world of smoke and mirrors, it is far less costly to buy ones
history than to make it.

Very good fully baked thoughts.

Larry (iThink) - Cleveland



-----Original Message-----
From: DeTomaso <detomaso-bounces at server.detomasolist.com> On Behalf Of
Charles Engles
Sent: March 14, 2019 7:04 PM
To: detomaso at server.detomasolist.com
Subject: [DeTomaso] The New DeTomaso?

 

 

                       “The New DeTomaso” ?

 

 

Geneva Auto Show and Dan Neil’s Observations and Electric Sports Cars  from
the WSJ  March 9, 2019

 

“Walking the aisles at the Geneva International Motor Show , I was having
déjà vu from before I was even born.  Some of the banners hanging from the
rafters of Palexpo convention center haven’t been seen in decades.  The
winner for Most Anachronistic: Hispano Suiza, the Spanish sporting and
luxury marque, summoned out of the historical ether and reimagined as a
“hyper-luxe” electric sports-car atelier.

 

At the Geneva show, the automobile’s glorious internal-combustion past was
being mined, repackaged, and repurposed to sell its electrified future; and
names of men who have been dead for decades were invoked to sell EVs as if
they were today’s angel investors.  

 

“The reason modern car companies go back to the past is to find legitimacy,
“said Silvio Pietro Angori, CEO of Pininfarina.  “I’m not a designer, I’m a
businessman.  I can tell you a brand is made up what a company does at its
best over a long period.  Some of these guy, they don’t have that.
Therefore, to find legitimacy, they have to go to the past, and not
necessarily their own past.”

Of course, if you are going to revel in history, it helps if it’s distant
history.

Battista “Pinin” Farina established a great carrosserie and design house in
Turin.  Among his triumphs was the pivotal Cisitalia 202GT Coupe (1947) and
truckloads of Ferraris.  After Battista died in 1966, the design firm
carried on and prospered, first under his son and then grandson.  In 2015,
the Indian conglomerate Mahindra Group bought Pinifarina to help with its
own car-building programs.

 

At the time Mahindra also authorized the company to build an electric
hypercar under the Automobili Pininfarina brand.  The result, first seen at
Geneva in production trim,  packs 1,847 hp and 1,696 pound-feet of torque
inside a carbon-monocoque missile that its maker say can accelerate to 180
mph in 11.8 seconds before topping out at 218 mph.”

 

My Half-Baked Thoughts

 

There have been many wishes and predictions of resurrection of DeTomaso
since it faded after the height of the Pantera years.   In this century,
there have already been a couple of tantalizing rumors and acquisitions of
the rights to the DeTomaso emblems, marque, etc.    If I recall correctly,
the Chinese currently own them . 

 

Now
. contemplate Dan Neil’s observations about E-sports car and hypercar
makers going shopping for legitimacy.   The latest riff on the old story of
the return of DeTomaso and a new Pantera might not have an internal
combustion engine.    It seems possible that some entity with an electric
sports car lacking in legitimacy could quickly buy it from the Chinese.
They could then spruce up the DeTomaso storyline and legacy.   They could
hire a graphic design firm to create the logos, emblems and badges for the
new electric twenty-first century DeTomaso sports cars.   The glory years of
Mangustas and Panteras and racing images would be hauled out and tweaked.
DeTomaso could rise from the ashes with a car so completely different from
what the Pantera cult has clamored for that there would be no good-will nor
continuity for the new E-tomaso by the old Pantera owners.   E-tomaso could
then forge ahead without the nuisance of assuaging the Panteraphiles and
market to a new generation and demographic.  That scenario would be
bittersweet.   I suppose that it would be nice for it to be a success, but I
am happy with mid-twentieth century sports cars and Ford 351 Clevelands.

 

                                 Warmest regards,  Chuck Engles




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