Never mind Google and Apple. A once renowned German automotive brand that went bust in 1961 is boldly declaring a comeback.
Borgward AG, a name few remember outside the world of automotive historians (and few in Germany who can remember the chancellorship of Konrad Adenaur), rented a display at the 2015 Geneva Auto Show, gaily decorated with Borgward’s logo.
Unlike the scores of other displays at the show, Borgward’s featured no car, no mockup of a car. Not even a picture of a car. Instead, the model Borgward intends to mass produce will be displayed at the Frankfurt Auto Show in the fall, according to the company.
Attending the press conference was Christian Borgward, grandson of the automaker’s late founder. He and Karlheinz Knoss, chief executive officer, have been working behind the scenes with “an ever-expanding group of expert engineers and designers” to develop “a breathtaking range of advanced new Borgward models.”
Can these people be serious? It’s hard to tell. The world has always adored, encouraged and rooted for the indefatigable automotive pioneer. The latest example is Elon Musk, co-founder of Tesla Motors Inc. His investors have bid the company up to a value of nearly $25 billion, despite the fact that Tesla sells fewer than 40,000 cars a year and has yet to post an annual net profit.
The reasons are simple why automotive start-ups are rare and successful ones even rarer. Required investments run into the billions. The failure rate is high. And the competition – from Ford to Toyota to Renault – is impressively entrenched.
A Borgward public relations representative, Lena Siep, declined to elaborate on the company’s press release. Meanwhile, the blogosphere features stories of an earlier, failed comeback attempt in 2006. An unconfirmed report declared that the company’s brand had been sold to Chinese automaker Beiqi Foton Motor.
The press release does state that Knoss “is secure in the knowledge that all the components are in place, having secured the backing of powerful global partners.”
During its run from the mid-1920s to the early 1960s, Borgward claims to have manufactured a million vehicles for the German and overseas markets, introducing to Germany such technical innovations as air suspension and automatic transmission. But at a time when Opel and Volkswagen were focused on the mass market and economies of scale, Borgward seemed immune to some fairly common business practices, such as designing common parts for multiple models.
Borgward’s most successful model was “Isabella,” introduced in the mid-1950s – a car that looks like it was attractive in its day. The business press at the time of the automaker’s bankruptcy reported it had developed too many models at once and modernized them beyond its financial capacity. Carl Borgward, the founder, insisted at the time of his death in 1963 that his company wasn’t insolvent and could have paid off creditors.
I asked Siep, the public relations person, whether Borgward was planning to sell its cars in the U.S. She said a marketing study revealed (unbelievably, in my opinion) that 60% of Americans still remember the car brand.
The auto show in Frankfurt takes place in six months. It’s fair to presume that Borgward will display a prototype, at which time automotive historians and enthusiasts will raise their glasses to the industry’s newest improbable venture.
