The Ford Motor company are expected to announce as early as this week their intention to sell their ownership of Aston Martin the Luxury performance car most synonomous with James Bond. Under Fords wing they have brought us the Vantage, the Vanquish and the all to beautiful DB9 and DBS.
The sale is expected to be NZD$1.27b noted by a source to the NZ Herald. Motor racing firm Prodrive working in conjunction with Egypts Naeem investment bank are at this point the front runners to buy the British hand made luxury sports brand. Other bidder named is the Doughty Hanson whom are also still in the running.
2 comments:
Ford's been a pretty good adoptive parent to its wards, generally, despite facing its own problems particularly in Detroit. The scary thing about selling of Aston is that R&D takes so much funding. Where a lot of engineering and electrical work and componentry has been available through Ford, Aston will not only need to have resources for engine design, but even for something like seat motors or air conditioning, unseen components whose many parts are currently purchased at mass production costs from Ford suppliers.
The economies of scale which can be achieved has made Aston a profitable entity once again. I wonder how long the new parent will be able to afford to keep it.
Concur Tony. We hope that the new owner takes this into consideration and does not run AM into the ground.
Ford admittedly have provided the funding to produce some spectacular vehicles over the past few years and it is with AM enthusists that the new owners can build on what Ford started out with.
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