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Porsche (VW) ethos for the 21st Century - Thoughts?

isysman

Well-known member
Joined
22 Apr 2011
Messages
6,627
Disco said:
isysman said:
I am referring to the people who are buying up the old manual cars.

People who buy used cars are of no interest to Porsche when it determines what it will build for its least profitable halo cars. More to the point - only serial buyers of new product are even going to get a slot in the queue for the limited production.

As I said earlier - if it is fast and they can easily sell them all, they will build pretty much what they like. Not what the keyboard warriors of the internet say that they want (but in the vast majority of cases will never buy anyway).

Just think about all of those PH crazies whining about there not being a rear seat option on GT3s, the frenzied anti-PDK movement and the people who want a GT3 without a rear spoiler. All suitably ignored by the boys in Stuttgart. :wink:

The people paying £160,000 for a second hand car are potential customers for Porsche. I'm sure Porsche would rather those people pay that money to them rather than a private seller. And the idea that Porsche don't care about these people who are their base is unfounded.

Anyway I can't be bothered with this discussion anymore. I disagree with you and that's not going to change.
 
There is a supposition here that Porsche, like say Morgan, build the car they want, and damn convention or market research (Morgan being well known previously to be arrogant stick in the muds and ignoring market research by never commissioning any - unless you include Sir John Harvey Jones, who they just ignored).

But Morgan are a hobby car company.

Porsche do have world domination on their horizon and market research to back it up.

That is why they have two SUVs in a sports car company.

It is even why they have an executive limo (albeit the most ugly executive limo in the world).

It's why the cars are bigger, plusher, and most importantly AUTOMATIC.

PDK is great for lower CO2 and faster 'Ring times, but it also sells you hundreds of thousands of units in China and the US.

That's market research.

That's giving your customers what they want.

The only time a commercial entity doesn't do what its customers want is if it costs too much or they are idiots.

Porsche (AKA VW) are NOT stupid.

You don't get to within a whisker literally of world domination without knowing what you are doing.

In VW's case (which we can assume is or if it isn't, will be, the group ethos eventually - just look at that new Lamborghini Huracan, shock horror, built to sell units primarily for Lamborghini, not posters for Arena), it is to sell as many units as possible.

Porsche was like Morgan, but then the water cooled era arrived (with Toyota productionisation consultants).

The rest is exponential history.
 
GT4 said:
Porsche was like Morgan, but then the water cooled era arrived (with Toyota productionisation consultants).

The rest is exponential history.

Agree up till the points above. The production, design and supply chain improvements began when Weidekin was rehired but before he was CEO. So your narrative doesn't fit the empirical facts. Weidekin could be argued to have added the segmentation focus when he became CEO, yes. But survival was the sole aim at that point, not world domination.

Of course you're entitled to your opinion on the significance of key events, but you're not entitled to your own facts.
 
Air cooled era Porsche had to change to survive.

The productisation was both to save money, but also to improve quality (don't tell the 993 brigade!)

By that I mean any product will improve in quality as production of that part is increased.

By quality, I of course mean repeatable and reliable level of finish.

The 993s may be well made, but to come out that well made took far too many man-hours.

Once you have a mechanical/automated process, you can easily ramp up production volumes (assuming your sales match or exceed your production rate).

World domination is not a Porsche trait, it is the VW trait.

But Porsche is now VW. I therefore believe that world domination is now firmly on their horizon.

That is what I meant to say, if it didn't come across clearly.

All the little "niche" brands VW owns all go to satisfy another little nook that it's previous brands didn't fully fill.

I am fully aware of the debt of gratitude the world owes the Boxster and the 996 for saving Porsche. I did not mention it here as I have mentioned it many times before, and it was not the point I was trying to make.

I also used the air to water as natural break point.

The parts chain may have been improved, but the 1990 cars were still built using closer to 1960s processes.

The reason any definitive change over date or line in the sand is fuzzy and perhaps more artistic licence (when applied to the company as a whole) is that it takes many (overlapping) years to even get a Boxster or 996 out of the gate (and thats ignoring other product lines). I mean the 993 was still built and sold simultaneously with the "space age" Boxster for over two years, and even partially with the 996.

Of course any board discussions or decisions on the company's future and the nettle it had to grasp were both well known and signed off much earlier.

But in the sense of a physical embodiment of all those changes (ie a complete vehicle rolling of the production line), the gross segregation is still air to water.

By that I mean in the 911 sense, of course Porsche already built water cooled models for decades. But the 911 presented a particular succession problem given they had tried to replace it for the best part of thirty years at the point the 996 came out!
 
Yup. :agree: with that synopsis. Though for me the real shift came with the Cayenne. And not for the reasons that are often assumed.

As a piece of business it was staggering in its brilliance. I used it and the Boxster for years as case studies.

But it was the success it garnered. Had that not happened in that way VW might not have started making grumblings about Porsche and Weidekin might not have started down his ultimately ruinous 'defense' of the brand. But it was the embarrassment VW suffered when the Toe-rag was used to fund the Cayenne's success that as the start of the problems. From then on it was only one guy who was going to leave the room standing......

(Sorry for the :hijack: guys but IMHO this stuff is waaaaaaaayyyyyy more interesting than 'dude, what's my car worth?' :wink: )
 
For me the real eye opener is the Macan.

The Cayenne's raisin d'être and its execution is text book (as in both commercial success, but also in the uninspiring and worthy sense).

By that I mean the question every car manufacturer in the late '90s/early '00s had to answer was: "What do we sell in the SUV class?"

To some extent, the opening of the Chinese (etc) markets less than 10 years later made this question even more pertinent.

The first Cayenne (9PA/955) was nothing to write home about as a vehicle and even the second full model (92A/958) is more a very commendable offering, rather than truly state of the art.

What the first certainly was, was a (very profitable) exercise in brand leverage, even if it made many Porschephiles queasy.

The Macan however is a wake up call to every other mid-size SUV manufacturer and an overnight toppling of the old guard.

The fact it surprisingly embodies more "Porscheness" than even some sports models is in some ways reassuring to the longevity of Porsche's DNA, whatever direction the company has to take in the future.
 
GT4 said:
It's why the cars are bigger, plusher, and most importantly AUTOMATIC.

PDK is great for lower CO2 and faster 'Ring times, but it also sells you hundreds of thousands of units in China and the US.

That's market research.

That's giving your customers what they want.

The only time a commercial entity doesn't do what its customers want is if it costs too much or they are idiots.

Porsche (AKA VW) are NOT stupid.

Reading this got me reminiscing about the mid 70's when Porsche attempted to replace the 911 with the 928.

Their attempt failed because the people that wanted a 911 back then didn't want a big, automatic, GT car.

Fast forward to now and a lot of people that want a [new] 911 do want a big, automatic, GT car - so that is what VW/Porsche are giving them.

The type of people that used to buy new 911s are now going to be swayed towards the Cayman. It's a shame for 911 enthusiasts but at least the Cayman is a far more 'spiritual successor' to the 911 of old than the 928 would ever have been.
 
All very romantic but at the end of the day it's capitalism. For better or for worse, in sickness and in health, until death (or workers revolution) do us part. :bandit:
 
T8 said:
GT4 said:
It's why the cars are bigger, plusher, and most importantly AUTOMATIC.

PDK is great for lower CO2 and faster 'Ring times, but it also sells you hundreds of thousands of units in China and the US.

That's market research.

That's giving your customers what they want.

The only time a commercial entity doesn't do what its customers want is if it costs too much or they are idiots.

Porsche (AKA VW) are NOT stupid.

Reading this got me reminiscing about the mid 70's when Porsche attempted to replace the 911 with the 928.

Their attempt failed because the people that wanted a 911 back then didn't want a big, automatic, GT car.

Fast forward to now and a lot of people that want a [new] 911 do want a big, automatic, GT car - so that is what VW/Porsche are giving them.

The type of people that used to buy new 911s are now going to be swayed towards the Cayman. It's a shame for 911 enthusiasts but at least the Cayman is a far more 'spiritual successor' to the 911 of old than the 928 would ever have been.

928 was definitely in my mind when I considered the broad brush of the 911's career.

As, perhaps, obliquely referenced here:

By that I mean in the 911 sense, of course Porsche already built water cooled models for decades. But the 911 presented a particular succession problem given they had tried to replace it for the best part of thirty years at the point the 996 came out!

The odd thing is, I love the 928, and I'd far rather have one of those than a 991 :coat:
 
GT4 said:
The odd thing is, I love the 928, and I'd far rather have one of those than a 991 :coat:

I too have a soft spot for the 928 as it is one of those rare things - a piece of car design that doesn't actually look that dated after almost 4 decades. I actually like them more now than when they were new too. But we will not see its like again I reckon - if they were to make another it would surely amount to a short wheelbase Panamera?

It is important not to ignore the fact that the design parameters of cars have changed though, and as a point of legislation cannot go back. The drivers in design are no longer styling, and even aerodynamics often have to take a back seat to crash test requirements and pedestrian impact standards. So the nose will continue to get higher and longer as time goes on for any given class of car. Indeed - almost every new generation of any new car seems to be a case of: my - hasn't she grown :nooo:

The upshot of this is that the 928 (which had real road presence when launched) now looks extremely compact and the 991 looks - frankly - like an absolute barge compared to anything from the air-cooled vintage. But not just that - even though the absolute dimensions aren't that far away, the 991 (especially the wide bodied variants) looks like a bit of a bus even next to a 997, with the subtle swelling of it's bonnet, wings, glasshouse and rump all conspiring to make it look larger than the tape measure would suggest in relation to its predecessor.
 
Yes, I was reading about the new Jag XE yesterday and they revealed that the reason they could get such a good frontal drag coefficient and lower bonnet than other marques in the segment was the (cheaty) use of a pyrotechnically activated bonnet.

The tech is not new, having been seen on some more expensive vehicles before, but not at this price point.

So the pedestrian height metrics can be made in the extended mode, but obviously 99.9% of the time it can stay down.
 
GT4 said:
World domination is not a Porsche trait, it is the VW trait.

But Porsche is now VW. I therefore believe that world domination is now firmly on their horizon.

Don't PORSCHE SE own VW??

So who's the Daddy?

PORSCHE SE's owner are the Porsche family.
 
No, that particular take-over went tits up when Porsche put too much faith in VW options.

Didn't help that Lower Saxony weren't playing ball with their golden vote.

The culmination of over two years and EUR11.4 BN of finagling by Porsche lead to a final hours reversal as VW managed to drag Porsche to the due date of their options (and a humongous margin call).

Then, as if to snatch the hand gun and flip it back into the face of the aggressor, VW ate Porsche.

Marvellous viewing 2009 through 2010.

Who's the Daddy!

18642qshw984jjpg.jpg
 
Well I've just got this of PORSCHE SE website:

"Porsche Automobil Holding SE is a listed holding company. It holds the majority of the ordinary shares in the Volkswagen Group, one of the world's leading automobile manufacturers. The Group comprises twelve brands from seven European countries: Volkswagen Passenger Cars, Audi, SEAT, Å KODA, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Porsche, Ducati, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles, Scania and MAN. In addition to this anchor shareholding, Porsche SE intends to make further strategic investments along the automotive value chain. This comprises the entire spectrum of basic technologies geared to supporting the development and production process through to vehicle- and mobility-related services."

http://www.porsche-se.com/pho/en/porschese/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porsche_Automobil_Holding_SE


So who's the Daddy?
 
Porsche SE is the holding group name, but Volkswagen AG owns Porsche AG (the car manufacturers).

The board are controlled by VW.

The reason the holding company is PAH is because the largest shareholders of both Porsche and VW are the Porsche/Piech family (Piech being the female line that lost the surname in marriage).

The multiple layers are quite complicated (it is almost a merger if anything, but it is still a victory by VW who were originally being stalked with a hostile takeover).

It was also a humiliating defeat for Wendelin Wiedeking's master plan, and he is facing criminal trial over his actions during the failed takeover attempt of Volkswagen.

In terms of executive powers, VW is the Daddy!
 

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