Ferdinand Porsche

Porsche trained largely through practical work rather than a university engineering degree. He built early electric and hybrid cars at Lohner around 1900 and later served as technical director at Austro-Daimler and Daimler-Benz, experience that shaped the Volkswagen design brief.

Ferdinand Porsche (1875-1951) was an Austrian-born automotive engineer who had worked for Lohner, Austro-Daimler and Daimler-Benz before opening his own design office in Stuttgart in 1931. In 1934 his office received the commission from the German government to develop an affordable 'people's car'. The company that became Volkswagen was set up in 1937 to build it, and Porsche led development of the air-cooled, rear-engined KdF-Wagen that was later sold as the Beetle. He also took part in planning the Wolfsburg plant. Volkswagen was a state project of the German Labour Front rather than a company Porsche owned; his own business later grew into Porsche AG. Ferdinand Porsche was born in 1875.