Volkswagen Buys Porsche After Porsche Bought Volkswagen

Bertel Schmitt
by Bertel Schmitt

And the deals, they keep on coming. Bloomberg reports that the Porsche and Piech families “plan to sell their main car assets to Volkswagen AG under a plan that would tighten Porsche SE’s grip on Europe’s biggest automaker.” Hold it right there: Haven’t they just BOUGHT Volkswagen? Are we confused yet? This is how it works:


As we all know, Porsche is gobbling up Volkswagen. Currently, Porsche holds 51 percent of Volkswagen, and that’s all they need for now. If they would have 75 percent of Volkswagen, then according to regular German law, they could combine Volkswagen and Porsche, move the headquarters to Zuffenhausen and rule the world’s (currently, Q1 09 numbers) largest automaker from there. However, there is a special law, for Volkswagen only, that gives anybody who owns 20 percent of Volkswagen a blocking minority. That anybody happens to be the state of Lower Saxony. Nothing goes without their say-so. Lower Saxony would be damned to let one of their, if not the largest tax payer go to another state. The matter is heading to the European court again, but their wheels grind slowly. Porsche doesn’t have that time. Actually, Porsche is getting short of money.

Yesterday, Automobilwoche [sub] reported that Porsche is looking for a large investor with deep pockets. The sugar daddy is supposed to “solve the financial problems surrounding the takeover of Volkswagen. The Porsche/Piech families can’t do it alone.” Reports in Germany are talking about potential Saudi-Arabian investors, the preferred partners of makers of high end gear.

But now, there is a better plan: Porsche, the family, sells Porsche, the car company to Volkswagen, which the family already rules. In return, they get VW shares they want and cash they need. “As part of the transaction, Porsche SE will issue new shares, a portion of which may be sold to external investors,” Bloomberg says.

Of course, the official party line is different. It’s the dreaded S word: Synergy. “We’re both capable of forming the center of strength in international carmaking,” Winterkorn said at VW’s annual shareholders’ meeting in Hamburg. “This alliance has enormous potential in technological and economic terms.” Winterkorn is obviously vying for a job as a stand-up comedian. In the first half of the 2008/2009 fiscal, Porsche sold just 34,266 units worldwide. Volkswagen made more than 6 million. They could crank out the worldwide Porsche production over a long week-end.

What’s more, a lot of the Porsche production is already intermeshed with VW. Volkswagen and Porsche already work together to build sport-utility vehicles and Porsche has tapped VW to assemble its Panamera four-person sedan. The companies also cooperate on SUVs such as Touareg, Cayenne and Audi’s Q7. No, Siree, synergies have nothing to do with it. If Porsche can’t swallow Volkswagen, then a Volkswagen owned by Porsche will swallow Porsche. It’s that simple. Even if it sounds confusing.

Bertel Schmitt
Bertel Schmitt

Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.

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  • Bertel Schmitt Bertel Schmitt on Apr 24, 2009
    (I’m not exactly sure how the system works here with the neighbours, but the first characters designate the place the owner of the car is registered I think, sometimes it’s clear to me as in WOB–> Wolfsburg, M –> München, but sometimes it isn’t.) In Germany, the first letters of the plate indeed designate the city or the county (Landkreis) where the car is registered. This also serves as the basis for derogatory remarks about the holders of such tags. "OF" (as in Offenbach) stands for "Ohne Führerschein" (without driver's license) if you ask the good folks in neighboring F as in Frankfurt. People in M as in Munich sometimes claim that "FFB" doesn't stand for neighboring Fürstenfeldbruck, but for "Fahrer fährt besoffen" (driver drives drunk.) Having been raised in said county, I must protest.
  • Anonymous Anonymous on Aug 27, 2011

    [...] And I dont think they own Bugatti either, but I might be wrong on that one... Yes, it does. Volkswagen Buys Porsche After Porsche Bought Volkswagen | The Truth About Cars Bugatti Veyron - Wikipedia, the free [...]

  • CanadaCraig You can just imagine how quickly the tires are going to wear out on a 5,800 lbs AWD 2024 Dodge Charger.
  • Luke42 I tried FSD for a month in December 2022 on my Model Y and wasn’t impressed.The building-blocks were amazing but sum of the all of those amazing parts was about as useful as Honda Sensing in terms of reducing the driver’s workload.I have a list of fixes I need to see in Autopilot before I blow another $200 renting FSD. But I will try it for free for a month.I would love it if FSD v12 lived up to the hype and my mind were changed. But I have no reason to believe I might be wrong at this point, based on the reviews I’ve read so far. [shrug]. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about it once I get to test it.
  • FormerFF We bought three new and one used car last year, so we won't be visiting any showrooms this year unless a meteor hits one of them. Sorry to hear that Mini has terminated the manual transmission, a Mini could be a fun car to drive with a stick.It appears that 2025 is going to see a significant decrease in the number of models that can be had with a stick. The used car we bought is a Mk 7 GTI with a six speed manual, and my younger daughter and I are enjoying it quite a lot. We'll be hanging on to it for many years.
  • Oberkanone Where is the value here? Magna is assembling the vehicles. The IP is not novel. Just buy the IP at bankruptcy stage for next to nothing.
  • Jalop1991 what, no Turbo trim?
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