Lamborghini
Since 1963, Automobili Lamborghini S.p.A. has manufactured sports cars in small numbers, in the small Italian village of Sant'Agata, between Bologna and Modena.
The company was a spin-off from the very successful tractor maker, Lamborghini Trattori S.p.A.. Its owner Ferruccio Lamborghini (1916–1993) was an enthusiastic owner of sports cars, including a Ferrari. The standard tale goes that he took this car back to the Ferrari factory when its clutch failed. Enzo Ferrari refused to meet him, saying that 'A tractor manufacturer could never be expected to understand high-bred sports cars'. So—after fixing the clutch with surprising ease—he decided to go into business building his own exotic sports cars.
Featuring bodies designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro and Marcello Gandini, Lamborghini's products are amongst the most expensive, and also most powerful, road-going vehicles made. As Ferruccio himself was a bullfighting afficionado, almost all models have a name somehow related to bullfighting.
Lamborghini's products included the Miura (1966), Countach (1974), Jalpa (1981), and Diablo (1990) as well as the LM002 (1986) off-road vehicle of which Road and Track magazine said, "With the 5.2 liter V-12, the LM002 can pass anything on the road—except a gas station".
The current (2004) range consists of the flagship Murcielago and the smaller, cheaper Gallardo. Both are very fast, mid-engined 2-seaters with four-wheel-drive as standard. Styling for both cars is largely the work of Belgian designer 1963–1970
See also: List of Italian companies
