Where would Prodrive get that kind of money? Another madcap rumor?

Apax owns 49% of Prodrive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apax_Partners

they would be the best possible owners, someody that can really put back into the game. they can give theese the power to match the looks.

Aston Martin P2 anybody?

It’s been all over the British and European news for the last week. I think it’s real. I know next to nothing about Prodrive except that that do build race cars and outfit for racing. They did have a couple of cars that were aimed at the WRC and and sports car racing but I haven’t heard much about it since. Still this is what a company like Aston Martin needs.

Still I think Prodrive is fronting for investors who are going to take the reins from FORD.

It’s good Prodrive got them, they at least have some experience tuning up Astons, unlike Versace, ha, that was a joke

YES!!!!!!!!!!

gumby, who gives a **** if they have some experience with Aston Martins. Its like the equivalent of Hamann buying Lamborghini. He has experience with Lambo’s but if he acquired Lambo that would be the end of great looking cars as we know it.

who cares

Hey Sharif,

You do know that Louis Vuitton has been dead for over 100 years, right? The company is now just a node in the LVMH holding company.

Yes- Aston-Martin may join F1!
Prodrive buys AM
Prodrive gets the last F1 team slot
AM is the Prodrive F1 entry.
Excellent!!

Sharif, are you serious?
Have you looked at Prodrive’s CV?
–Multiple World Rally driver championships
–Multiple World Rally manufacturer championships
–Involvement with Honda took it from an 8 out of 11 ranked team to a 4 out of 11 team (surpassing mighty Toyota).

Prodrive know’s their stuff. This can only be good for AM.

the best thing to happen to british cars since the e-type. Now aston martin won’t just look gorgeous but will be monsters at the racetrack.

Aston Martin is a 1 trick pony, they need a fresh sytle.

“Aston Martin P2 anybody?”

Damn jdepould you beat me to it.
I would love to see a Aston P2, but I don’t see how that would be possible since the P2 is based on Subaru STi engine and AWD systems. Does Aston even have an AWD platform? It would be a great little entry level Aston to go up against the Porsche Cayman though. I’d buy one. Hell I would have bought one even if it was a new Subaru SVX. Prodrive needs to just build the P2 already.

hey sharif, if it happened, would you have louis vuitton buy lamborghini or Hamann? a company that has actually had experience with cars, and specifically, lamborghinis, basically, it’s best for Prodrive to buy Aston because they actually care about making a car better in every aspect, especially its performance

COuld be worse….much much worse!

At least Prodrive know how to build good cars, now they will have manufacturing facilities to allow themto build road cars and a strong prand to sell them under.

As far as Aston, Prodrive’s motorsports expertise should keep their products competitive and give a certain substance to the brand that, say, a luggage company couldn’t

I’d sleep much better knowing that Prodrive took over Aston Martin instead of Louis Vuitton. If this is indeed true, then I say this is good news!

Jettisoning the brand now makes sense as Ford spirals down. Prodrive could do interesting things with A|M.

yeah i like that the V8 has more power, thats all it needed

I wish Ford would keep Aston Martin and dump Land Rover. I know, easier said than done. Ford needs the money in a bad way. I remember working for a Ford dealership in ‘96 and Ford had 5 of the top 10 selling cars in the U.s. My, how things have changed. There’s no doubt in my mind that Ford will come back strong, but it’s still going to take a while. All of the manufacturers need to dump all of this incentive crap and these huge rebates. GM is the one that started this whole mess and now it’s killing the used vehicle market and every consumer expects these huge discounts on the vehicles. Why buy a used one when you can get a new one for a little more?!? Anyway, I’d take an Aston Martin over a Ferrari any day of the week!

While Ford is selling the brand, Ford announced in January that the brand is in good standing due to renewed interest in the brand. The interest of the public on the brand may have been brought on by the talks surrounding the sale of the brand due to its upgraded parts of hypertech. And, of course, the appearance of Aston Martin cars on James Bond movies certainly did help.

Hurrah! British-owned Aston Martin, and what an owner! David Richards told a friend of mine about this a while ago, but he was only in discussions at the time. I just saw on a British news channel that there has been a last minute hitch though, so I’m not popping the champagne cork yet.

P.S. correy – wtf are you on about?

aston martins might become better cars but it wont have as much pimp factor like it would have if it was bought by LMVH

The racing Aston Martin DBR9 has been run by prodrive the last couple of years …so why not…they know what they are doing…if it goes through it is a much better outcome than Louis Vuitton as a owner…that would make Aston lose all street creds.

I hope Prodrive doesn’t ruin Aston’s pedigree with too much technical stuff. Otherwise, I totally agree with europerspective, as live in the UK as well. Aston Martin is my absolute favourite car make, and its good its been returned to its rightful owners

Next on the selling block: Jaguar…

Apax which owns Prodrive owns the Tommy Hilfiger brand.

Excellent article in the March issue of Evo about the reliability of supercars; Porsche makes everyone look Yugo-esque including the RS6 from Audi.

LVMH would have made Aston Martins look better, and Prodrive will make Aston Martins perform better. I think AM needs more work in the performance department than in the looks department. So, I have to say I think its better that Prodrive is buying AM. And Prodrive has more experience with cars.

for some reason these cars have never done anything for me at all….
i’m sure they are amazing… just never caught my attention