Since then, two protagonists, Wendelin Wiedeking and Holgar Härter, have helped steer Porsche into the incredible position of actually taking over Europe’s largest car company, Volkswagen. VW is after all 15 times bigger than Porsche in terms of revenues and it has nearly 30 times as many employees.
It must be stated that Porsche and VW are no strangers to each other. The first ever VW, the Beetle, was designed by none other than Ferdianand Porsche (the founder of the Zuffenhausen-based sports car manufacturer). And in fact, the first Porsche car, the Porsche 64 of 1938, used many components from the Volkswagen Beetle. Collaborations have continued all the way to 2002 when Porsche and Volkswagen created the Cayenne / Touareg, built at the Volkswagen factory in Bratislava.
So just who is Wiedeking? He is a larger-than-life character that started as head of Porsche’s production and materials department before becoming the company ceo. He revolutionised the company, benchmarking the production process, slashing production costs, while streamlining the workforce. He essentially succeeded in transforming Porsche into a lean, super-efficient business that makes some of the most sought-after cars on the planet.
He was the man who decided to launch the crucial Boxster, a smaller, more affordable model. Later, and even more controversially, he brought out the Cayenne, a 4x4 that broke the Porsche mould. This year he is launching another groundbreaking model, the Panamera which is a four-door coupé. The result of all of this is that Porsche’s sales have reached almost three quarters of a million units. Wiedeking succeeded in making Porsche one of the most desirable brands in the world and crucially one of the one of the most financially successful.
Holgar Härter is the chief financial officer of Porsche and the man who not only helped in transforming the manufacturer into the world’s most profitable carmaker; he actually orchestrated the takeover of VW. Many analysts say that Härter fashioned out of Porsche a, “hedge fund with a captive auto business.” This was further corroborated by Wiedeking at the Frankfurt auto show in 2003 when he stated that, “My cfo can make money even when we’re not selling cars.”
What is most remarkable is that this takeover was not financed by shareholders. What Härter actually did was create the first ever stealth takeover via call options, settled in cash as opposed to stock. Therefore Porsche was able to buy into huge amounts of VW stock without the need to publicly disclose what they were up to. In essence and according to German law, once the takeover has been approved by various courts, VW will be a mere subsidiary of Porsche. The automotive landscape has certainly been redrawn and no one can ever deny that this move by Porsche was true genius.
