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What exactly has the Italian automobile industry experienced in the past hundred years, why has it risen, and why has it declined?

Italy had two glorious histories, which happened to be at both ends of human civilization: one originated from the ancient Roman Empire, which lasted for thousands of years, and the other originated from the modern Renaissance.

Unfortunately, with the rise of European powers, Italy has also spent a period of vagrancy.

First Austria took Florence, then France gnawed down Genoa, and even Sicily was acquired by Spain, which came from afar.

Faced with a history of humiliation, Italy could only hold back tears until it became a "little fan" of Prussia.

At the end of the 19th century, when Bismarck, the iron prime minister, launched the war to unify Germany, Italy was reunified under the leadership of Ghafour.

At the sound of the horn of the industrial revolution, Italy followed Germany and started a wave of industrialization, making families rich by doing military work.

In 1853, Ansaldo was founded, the largest military industrial group in early Italy, and produced most of the cannons of the Italian World War I.

Ninety years later, the "Italian cannon" used by Li Yunlong to attack Ping an County was not really made in Italy, but an M1897 field gun exported from France to Italy.

During World War I, Italy imported a large number of M1897 howitzers from France, some of which were sold to China and transferred to the hands of the eighth Route Army, becoming a "big weapon" to crush the Japanese.

Because it was exported to Italy, the gun body was engraved with Italian, which was mistaken for Italian-made artillery by the eighth Route Army.

This may reflect the shrewdness of Italian businessmen.

While Europe's major capitalist countries are in full swing to study cars with internal combustion engines, Italy's Pirelli tires have quietly shifted from bicycle tires to car tires, making a lot of money.

However, there are also many Italians who have a strong interest in the novelty of cars, such as Giovanni Agnelli, mayor of the Italian city of Vilar Parosa.

In 1899, he persuaded a number of wealthy Italian businessmen to co-finance the establishment of the Italian car factory in Turin, known today as "FIAT".

In the year of its establishment, the first model, the Fiat 4 HP, was born.

The car is very similar in shape to a horse-drawn carriage, with a manually folded roof, a two-cylinder 679cc engine and a three-speed transmission (no reverse), with a top speed of up to 35km / h, only slightly faster than the carriage.

The birth of Fiat means that Italy, following Germany, can't wait to enter the age of cars.

In order to quickly expand the popularity of his brand, the business-minded Agnelli decided to let more people know Fiat's name through a car race.

In the first Italian city race in 1902, a total of nine Fiats successfully reached the finish line. In the Sassi Superga climbing race held in the same year, the Fiat 24 HP Corsa driven by Vincenzo Lancia achieved brilliant results, with a 6.4L engine that allowed it to set a speed record of 95km / h at that time.

In 1906, perhaps because he was not satisfied with Fiat's racing performance, Vincenzo Lancia founded Lancia in Turin. For the first time, the whole vehicle adopts integrated body structure, metal body, independent front wheel suspension and load-bearing chassis, which establishes the basic shape of modern car.

This year, Fiat is already the leader in Italian cars, producing more than 1000 vehicles, of which 300 have been exported to the United States. In the same year, Fiat went public, and the stock reached a record 1885 lira in a very short time, providing valuable funds for the follow-up development of the enterprise.

During the first World War, the exuberant arms industry directly stimulated the development of the Italian automobile industry, and many car factories sprang up like bamboo shoots after a spring rain.

In 1915, Yogo Enkatu and a group of racing fans and businessmen founded Alpha in Milan. When the "big financier" Nicola Romeo joined, the company changed its name to Alfa Romeo and has been committed to racing.

Alfa Romeo's "killer mace" is the famous P2 racing car, which is invincible with the help of a brand new in-line eight-cylinder engine and a dual supercharger.

With speed and passion, Enzo Ferrari came to Alfa Romeo and led the team to fight in all directions.

When the smoke of World War I dissipated, Fiat became the final winner.

Under the leadership of Giovanni Agnelli, Fiat has more than 40 factories and extends its business from cars to aircraft, aero-engines and guns, making it the largest carmaker in Italy.

In 1927, Ford in the United States had sold its 15 million car, and Europeans were listening to jazz from the other side of the ocean on the radio, reveling in the elegance and glitz of the heyday.

Under the flowers, the crisis has quietly grown.

Two years later, on a "Black Tuesday", the world economic crisis broke out, and the rift quickly spread across Europe as if the crystal had been broken by a heavy hammer.

Italy is not immune, too, and in exchange for much-needed steel, oil and coal, it has to export cars desperately in exchange for foreign exchange.

In order to boost car sales as soon as possible, Italian cars are once again associated with various car races, designing the world's earliest car track, Monza.

On the humble track, cars roared past, and the haze of war filled the distance again.

Before the outbreak of World War II, after Mussolini came to power, Italy under the fascist iron fist began the rapid development of military industry and heavy industry.

In the four years before World War II, Fiat's workforce grew tenfold, from 4000 to 40, 000.

Romantic Italians are not ambiguous in weapon manufacturing. Fiat designed the first tank and first plane for the Italian military, as well as various types of tanks, aircraft and vehicles for the German army.

Although it became an accomplice of the Nazis, Italy was forgiven by the allies for its timely "awakening" and hip-pulling effectiveness.

However, with the collapse of the fascist system, Italy's once self-sufficient and closed-door economic system was forced to change and learn to integrate into the European single market.

Because Italy's industrial damage rate in World War II was only about 13%, which was the least among European industrial countries, and benefited from the European recovery Plan (European Recovery Program), it was the first to achieve a "bottom rebound".

The Italian auto industry has become the most important symbol of economic recovery.

On the rugged track, the most dazzling is the "dark horse"-Ferrari.

After joining Alfa Romeo, Enzo Ferrari soon became the most prestigious driver in Italy with superb skills and a number of racing championships.

In 1929, Enzo Ferrari founded its own racing modification company, Ferrari, with the help of Fiat, which is half owned by Fiat.

In the same year, Enzo founded the "Ferrari Racing team" (Scuderia Ferrari) with his surname, which is the origin of today's Ferrari side shield marked with "SF".

After that, Enzo, as captain, led the Ferrari team to achieve amazing results in various races, becoming a world-class racing driver, and Ferrari gradually became synonymous with super cars.

The "dark horse" logo on the Ferrari is actually in memory of Enzo Ferrari's brother Dino Ferrari.

During World War I, Dino Ferrari and his good friend Francisco Baraka were both pilots of the Italian Air Force. In search of good luck, a silver jumping horse was painted on the Baraka fighter plane. During the battle, the two comrades-in-arms forged a profound friendship.

It is a pity that they died in battle one after another. Enzo Ferrari went to Baraka's home to pay his condolences, and Baraka's mother suggested that the silver jumping horse pattern on her son's plane be given to Ferrari, symbolizing both the fast racing driver and the memory of the two young pilots forever.

Enzo Ferrari readily agreed that in memory of his brother and his comrade-in-arms, he changed the silver jumping horse to today's black jumping horse pattern.

In 1939, Enzo Ferrari left Alfa Romeo and agreed to follow a competitive agreement not to build cars in his own name for four years.

After the end of World War II, the commercial restrictions between Ferrari and Alfa expired.

In 1947, 49-year-old Enzo Ferrari developed his first sports car, the Ferrari L25S.

Since then, the world circuit began to skim over the "red lightning".

In 1950, Ferrari won the championship in the World Formula one (F1) race and became the absolute overlord of this track.

When Ferrari was racing on the field, Italian farmers were driving Lamborghini tractors and working hard.

Yes, Lamborghini started out as a tractor manufacturer.

After World War II, Ferruccio Lamborghini, a mechanic of the Italian Air Force, built tractors from a large amount of surplus military materials and founded the original Lamborghini Company (Lamborghini Trattori S.p.A.).

Ferruccio Lamborghini also loves racing and personally modified a Ferrari 250GT, but is not satisfied with the performance.

In 1963, Ferrucio gave some advice on Ferrari's clutch design, which was rejected by Ferrari: "you don't need a tractor maker to tell me how to build a sports car."

In a fit of anger, Lamborghini also crossed the border into the sports car market.

In 1964, Lamborghini established his status by launching the famous 350GT sports car at the Geneva Motor Show.

It is worth mentioning that Lamborghini is still producing tractors, one of which is called Nitro, which is written by Giorgiaro, a famous Italian car designer, and is called "fighter in tractors".

Georgiaro is no stranger to Chinese fans.

All his life, he is famous for designing more than 200 cars and numerous industrial products, and is known as the "master of design of the century" and "the god of Italian design".

In China, George Yaro has also brought confidence to Chinese car companies that are not yet confident.

He first cooperated with China Motor to create the Chinese Morning Wind, and then was packaged as Zhonghua Zunchi by Binnifarina.

Subsequently, Georgiaro's studio in the form of design outsourcing to undertake Chery, Geely, brilliance, Dongfeng Fengshen, FAW Pentium and other independent brands of car design.

It's not cheap to find Georgiaro to develop a new car, and the design costs hundreds of millions of dollars.

Chinese car companies are willing to spend a lot of money looking for Georgiaro because the cars he and his team have designed are classics of various brands: Fiat Panda, Volkswagen first-generation Golf, Pastor, Alfa Romeo GT, BMW M1, De Lorean DMC12, Ferrari 250GT, Aston Martin DB4, etc.

The most classic is Giorgiaro's Ferrari 250GT. The classic fiery, waterdrop body and even the improved design of the Jump Horse logo are all written by him.

The 250GT power part uses an all-aluminum 3.0L V12 naturally aspirated engine with maximum power of 300hp and maximum torque of 330Nm, and is equipped with a five-speed manual transmission, which accelerates in only 5.8s at 100km and top speed up to 280km / h.

It is also because of this car that Lamborghini and Ferrari have become sworn enemies.

Giorgiaro compared car design to music. "Beautiful car design is like music," he said. "people may not understand it intuitively, but they will feel it."

Alongside Giorgiaro, the Italian sports car industry was also played by designer Olasio Pagani.

Pagani, an Argentine and a former designer for car companies such as Ford and Chevrolet, came to Broadcom Industrial Design in Italy and began an amazing artistic life because of his interest in sports car design.

He has been involved in many designs, such as the Alfa Romeo Giulia GT, Ferrari 250GT, BMW 3200CS, Maserati 5000GT, Fiat 850Spider and Chevrolet Corvair Testudo, and even the Aston Martin DB4 jet.

Pagani later joined Lamborghini to design the Lamborghini Countach 25th anniversary edition and the Countach Evolution, the first sports car made of carbon fiber and a lot of composite materials, which can reach a top speed of 300km / h because of its extremely light weight.

However, any talented car designer has his own "brand dream", and Pagani is no exception. He later renamed his design agency Pagani Motors and eventually developed the world's most expensive sports car brand, Pagani.

Pagani from the first production car, adhere to the pure hand-made and personalized customization, each model is a limited edition, expensive.

Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, customized a $1.3 million Huayra supercar from Pagani, and the vehicle data are still secret.

Even Pagani has crossed into the clothing circle, and Pagani (Horacio Pagani) is by far the number one fashion brand in the world, with design elements closely following the Pagani sports car concept, with black, white and gray colors and sexy and exquisite styles.

It is not difficult to see that race car drivers and tractor owners in a country can build sports cars across the border. Moreover, car companies can also enter the fashion industry, which shows the strength of art and design behind it.

4 the Italian Tourism Board has such a slogan: Italy is not a country of design, Italy itself means design.

Interestingly, Italian car design is famous all over the world, but universities only opened majors related to automobile design in the 1980s.

Before that, most Italian car designers graduated from the architecture department of the Milan Institute of Technology.

So far, the automobile design majors of Milan Polytechnic Institute and Turin Institute of Architecture in Italy are among the top disciplines in the world.

Science and technology can empower the times, while art can give back the temperament of the times.

In Italy, art and technology are twins.

This is not surprising, the profound history and culture has given each Italian a unique aesthetic taste, but also let them have a super practical ability.

Italian painter Leonardo da Vinci is "a great master of the perfect combination of technology and art". Italian missionary Lang Shining not only painted a good oil painting, but also designed and built Old Summer Palace. With the ringing of the bell, the animal head of the Great Water method spits a surging current and pays tribute to a human miracle of infatuated intersection of science and technology and art.

Since there are no industry barriers or barriers, anyone in Italy has the opportunity to become a car designer.

The collision of different design styles has created a colorful car brand in Italy.

Italian car design is also a "model" in European car design circles. For example, Alfa Romeo has always been the "textbook" of car design, and Ferrari and Lamborghini are almost the benchmark of sports car design.

Amid the roar of sports cars, Italian minicars quietly appeared on the stage.

The Fiat 124 subcompact, which sold 1.5 million cars, was introduced by the Soviet Union and transformed into a Lada sedan.

Fiat's Panda Mini and Pario cars broke into South America and Eastern Europe, becoming champions in Brazil, Argentina and Poland, with export revenues accounting for 60% of total sales.

Affordable minicars also make Italy one of the countries with the highest number of cars in the world, with 62 cars per 100 residents, and Italy ranks second in terms of per capita car ownership in Europe.

However, as one of the pioneer countries of the car, Italy's car production is not high.

In 2021, Italy produced only 670000 cars, not at all among the countries that produce cars in the world.

But the best thing about the Italian auto industry is that it doesn't sell much and has a lot of styles.

Italian car design is different from the principle of practical supremacy in other European countries, more to show artistic charm and to meet the individual needs of customers.

Italian cars after World War II are sold individually, each with a wide variety of special models: from powertrain to tires and rearview mirrors, they can be customized and modified as long as customers need them.

This is due to the poor degree of industrialization in Italy, and all kinds of small workshops are everywhere, completely to meet the needs of the market.

In the good times, art was the most respected, which gave birth to a variety of high-end fashion industries in Italy.

However, in the face of the automobile industry with higher technical requirements, it is impossible to complete the industrial upgrading by relying solely on the creativity of artists.

What's more, Italy has an unknown weakness: Italy's level of basic education is much lower than that of the rest of Europe.

In the early 1980s, a survey by the European Community showed that 15 million people in Italy were semi-illiterate (less literate), accounting for about 30 per cent of the total population.

What is even more distressing is that the world's first university, the University of Bologna, was founded in Italy and has a history of thousands of years. This university is not only the academic center of medieval Europe, but also the spark of the enlightenment of human civilization.

But of the top 100 QS world universities in 2022, there are four in France, three in Germany and Switzerland, two in small countries such as the Netherlands and Denmark, and none in Italy.

Without a perfect education system, the reserve of technology and talents needed for the development of modern automobile industry can not be realized.

Even Italy is known as Europe's "paradise" for small and medium-sized enterprises, with small businesses with less than 10 people accounting for 95% of the economic ecology.

But this just proves that Italy lacks the soil for large-scale industrial development, goes its own way, and is unable to amortize high R & D and innovation investment.

Objectively speaking, the overall scientific and technological strength of Italian industry is not weak.

Machinery manufacturing has always been Italy's largest export industry, accounting for 18% of international trade. Italy is also the world's fifth largest exporter of machinery.

In the automobile industry, the automobile enterprises represented by Fiat are at the advanced level in the world in the field of vehicle and engine design and manufacture, R & D capability and level, manufacturing technology and technology.

In the manufacturing of spare parts, Italian auto parts production has a long history, especially tires and precision machinery, appliance machinery, gears, connectors and moulds are among the best in the world.

VM, an Italian company specializing in diesel engines, has provided engines for range Rover, Rover 800 and Alfa Romeo, ranking just behind AVL of Austria, FEV of Germany and Ricardo of the United Kingdom.

Even Jiangling, Huatai, Changfeng, Great Wall and SAIC purchased the diesel engine manufacturing technology and key production equipment of VM before embarking on the road of independent research and development.

But the modern automobile industry pursues economies of scale, no matter how good craftsmen or wonderful ideas are, it is impossible to play without funds.

The tariffs of the European Community were abolished in 1993, and with the establishment of the euro zone, Italy's domestic market completely "fell" and became a dumping ground for industrial products in Germany, France and other countries.

The Italian sports car is very dazzling, but how many people can afford it? Fiat cars are affordable, but in the face of cheaper and better Japanese and Korean cars, what can be used to attract people?

The market can't keep up, the economy is still depressed, but Italy's welfare is so envious of others.

"lovely Italian" people only like vacations and don't like to go to work. I only work 32 hours a week, take 3 days off, and have to be paid 14 months.

Not only education and medical care are free, but every August, all Italians have a "paid summer vacation" to travel collectively to the seaside or scenic spots.

Romantic Italians also put glass cabinets in the streets to store roses, which read: "if you encounter love, please break the glass."

High welfare needs money, romantic love needs money more, but the problem is that Italy has no money.

Italy has to raise taxes and borrow desperately, and the snowball is getting bigger and bigger. In 2018, Italy's public debt reached a staggering 134.8% of GDP.

After that, Italy can only watch the brands that represent the glory of the past being acquired by foreign investors one by one.

Bulgari was acquired by France's LVMH, Gucci was acquired by France's Kering Group, and even Lamborghini was in the bag of German Volkswagen.

Even Pirelli tires, which are hundreds of years old, have been acquired by Sinochem.

Among the Italian car companies, only Fiat is the most respectable.

After the 1960s, Fiat acquired Ferrari, Maserati and Alfa Romeo, basically unifying the Italian auto industry.

In 2009, Fiat jumped from the tenth largest car company in the world to the sixth largest car company in the world, taking advantage of the bankruptcy crisis of Chrysler in the United States.

But many Italians roll their eyes and feel that Chrysler doesn't understand in German hands. Is Fiat more capable?

After the European debt crisis after 2012, Fiat is "mud Bodhisattva crossing the river, it is difficult to protect itself."

Unexpectedly, Chrysler benefited from the recovery of the US economy and made a net profit of nearly $2 billion for Fiat.

Bankruptcy price bottom + V-shaped reversal of the big return, Fiat this investment, really win the "hemp".

The Agnelli family behind the scenes has simply become the "stock god" in the minds of the Italians.

The Agnelli family also realized that the combination of strong and strong forces is the general trend of the world, and they have more frequent contact with all kinds of global car companies.

After being rejected many times, PSA (Peugeot Citroen) shyly took over Fiat's olive branch.

In 2019, PSA (Peugeot Citroen) and FCA (Fiat Chrysler) signed an agreement to form a new group, Stellantis, with a 50 per cent share ratio.

As a result, a super giant with a total of 13 car brands has emerged across Europe and the United States, including Citroen, DS, Opel, Peugeot, Vauxhall, Alfa Romeo Chrysler, Dodge, Fiat, JEEP, Lancia, Maserati and Ram.

In the year of the agreement, Strandis sold 8 million vehicles a year, making it the fourth largest auto company in the world after Volkswagen, Toyota and Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi alliance.

The whole Italian automobile industry has almost become the industry of the Agnelli family.

In fact, the Agnelli family business extends far beyond the Strantis Automobile Group, but also owns core assets such as Ferrari and Juventus Football Club.

Yes, Italy also has a world-famous football team, which has always been the favourite to win the World Cup.

It is a pity that in the current Italian football team, three veterans Chiellini, Bonucci and Asselby are nearly 40-year-old "old people" and have not been able to find suitable replacements.

Italy lost unexpectedly to North Macedonia in the European Group C semi-finals of the 2022 World Cup qualifiers.

Making this World Cup in Qatar, the "Azzurri" missed two consecutive World Cups, completely reduced to spectators.

The final whistle blew and the beautiful era belonging to the Italian team came to an end.

Outside the green field, the Italian auto industry is walking slowly, competitors pass by from time to time, and the track ahead is still long and challenging.

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: ID:lishiqiche2016, author: Wang Jian

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