Consumer Reports: Does Volkswagen Own Lamborghini and Bugatti?
The Volkswagen Group owns a lot more than just the Volkswagen brand you might see on the road these days. This isn’t an uncommon practice, but Volkswagen is one of the larger umbrella brands to own a few smaller brands under it. Those brands include Lamborghini and Porsche. Stellantis owns quite a number of brands, both in the U.S. and in Europe.
Volkswagen does own Lamborghini, among other brands
The Volkswagen Group does own Lamborghini and has since 1998. According to Consumer Reports, Automobili Lamborghini was founded in 1963 in Northern Italy and currently has around 1,800 employees. It has 167 dealerships worldwide and has vehicles in the lineup, such as the Huracán, Aventador, and Urus Super SUV.
In a press release from June of 1998, it was announced that Volkswagen Audi Auto Group offered around $100 million for the brand. It was not confirmed what the brand actually sold for at the time. At the same time, Volkswagen also purchased Rolls-Royce Motor Cars.
Chrysler Corporation owned Lamborghini from 1988 until 1993, which made Volkswagen the seventh owner in Lamborghini’s 35-year history (at the time of sale).
How many brands does Volkswagen own?
Volkswagen group actually owns a lot of different brands. Currently, it owns Porsche, Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, and Volkswagen. It isn’t unusual for a large group like Volkswagen to own a lot of smaller brands.
In fact, Stellantis owns quite a few brands after the merger between Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and Peugeot S.A. The brands included are Ram, Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, Maserati, Fiat. Overseas, Stellantis owns and operates Peugeot, Citroen, Opel, DS Automobiles, and Vauxhall.
General Motors (GM) owns a few brands as well. In the U.S., GM owns Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, and GMC. Hummer is owned under GMC. The brand has some new electric vehicles on the way, like the GMC Hummer EV.
Daimler AG owns the Mercedes brand. The BMW group owns BMW, Mini, and Rolls-Royce. Hyundai owns Hyundai, Genesis, and Kia, and Honda Motor Co. owns Honda and Acura.
The supercar brand also makes tractors
Lamborghini actually started as Lamborghini Trattori in 1948 by Ferruccio Lamborghini. The headquarters is in Pieve di Cento, Italy. Lamborghini used American-made used military surplus materials to make these first tractors. “With time, research, and passion, the brand became synonymous with innovation in the production of agricultural machinery.” To this day, the company still produces around 2,000 tractors each year.
Car and Driver took a Lamborghini Nitro tractor on an adventure Stelvio Pass in Italy in 2014. At that time, the tractors started around $94,600 for the Nitro tractor. The fully-loaded version was more like $146,000. If you plan on buying new, you can plan on spending upwards of $150,000.
The brand has been switching things up lately with the introduction of the Urus SUV and keeping production up on the tractors. While the luxury sports car brand might not make a large volume of vehicles each year, it is still one of the more popular vehicles on the luxury market.
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