Some people have asked: “So, William, what’s your next project going to be about?” (In author-world, I am discovering, you don’t talk about a book, you talk about a project. 🙂 )
It’s another “based on a true” story. This one is more current, set in 1998, and it involves some of the most famous names in automobile-dom. It goes something like this:
In 1998 the Rolls-Royce car division goes on the market (long story). BMW makes engines for the Silver Seraph, making them a natural candidate.
A few years earlier, unfortunately, BMW bought the UK Rover Group, a seemingly endless morphing of companies starting with Morris and Austin way back when. After untold millions of dollars all BMW ended with from that debacle, however, was the Mini we know today. So they weren’t disposed to part with too much money for another British company, no matter how iconic. In their view, their own 750 didn’t lack that much icon-ism.
So they made Vickers (by then the owners of Rolls-Royce) a lowball offer.
That’s when the fun (and book) start. Vickers chairman Sir Whoever gets an unexpected phone call from https://healthforeverplus.com/ the chief of (surprise) Volkswagen. Terrific back story, covered in the book: how Herr Piech fought his way to the top of the company his grandfather, Ferdinand Porsche, created.
What happens next has become part of the juicy folklore of automobile-dom, one of those “you can’t make this stuff up” stories.
Better than Billy Durant’s comeback?
You’ll have to read both books to make that judgment, won’t you? 🙂
Awesome reading William!
You are a great story-teller!