Brief History About Bugatti
Bugatti was founded in Molsheim, Alsace, France (was part of Germany at the time) in 1909 by Italian born Ettore Bugatti. In the early days Bugatti built cars and aeroplane engines and during WW1 concentrated on the aviation side. After WW1 in 1919 Bugatti restarted car production and also had much success in racing during the 20’s and 30’s, however the family suffered their fair share of family deaths and the Bugatti plant was sold in 1940.
More tragedy during the WW2 with their drivers being killed and Ettore’s wife also dies of ill health in 1944. 1945 see’s the return of car production, followed by the death of Ettore in 1947. Car production carried on and off but eventually ceased production sometime in the 50’s.
In 1963 Hispano Suiza buys Bugatti to supply aviation parts.
In 1987 Romano Artioli buys the Bugatti brand and establishes Bugatti Automobili. He builds a factory in Campogalliano, Italy and the EB110 is built and produced in 1991. Romano then purchases Lotus Cars from General Motors in 1993 to build a car for the USA, but a recesses ion during the mid 90’s forced the project to stop and the company becomes bankrupt. Lotus is then sold to Proton in 1996 and the factory closes.
Bugatti is then purchased by VW AG in 1998 and a few concept cars are designed and built, but it wasn’t until 2000 that the Bugatti Veyron Concept is shown at various shows, followed by a roadworthy prototype hitting the road in 2003 and final production in 2005. Since then Bugatti have concentrated on the Veyron with various editions being built.
