Private company

De Tomaso

Logo: Unknown author Unknown author, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons3

Italian car manufacturing company

De Tomaso Automobili Ltd. (previously known as De Tomaso Modena SpA) is an Italian car-manufacturing company. It was founded in 1959 by the Argentine Alejandro de Tomaso in Modena. It originally produced various sports prototypes and auto racing vehicles, including a Formula One car for Frank Williams Racing Cars in 1970.2 It is part of Ford Motor Company.1 It ceased to exist in 2012.1 Wikipedia text CC BY-SA 4.0

Last updated Oct 21, 2026.

Overview

2019Founded1
Italien Grugliasco Gebäude von De Tomaso
Photo: Buch-t, GFDL, via Wikimedia Commons5

De Tomaso Automobili Ltd. (previously known as De Tomaso Modena SpA) is an Italian car-manufacturing company. It was founded in 1959 by the Argentine Alejandro de Tomaso in Modena. It originally produced various sports prototypes and auto racing vehicles, including a Formula One car for Frank Williams Racing Cars in 1970. Most of the automaker's funding came from Amory Haskell Jr.2

The story

Founded by Alejandro de Tomaso in 2019, in Modena.1

The company went on to develop and produce both sports cars and luxury vehicles, most notably the Ford-powered Italian-bodied Mangusta and Pantera. From 1976 to 1993, De Tomaso owned Italian sports car maker Maserati, and was responsible for producing cars including the Biturbo, the Kyalami, Quattroporte III, Karif and the Chrysler TC. De Tomaso also owned motorcycle company Moto Guzzi from 1973 to 1993.

De Tomaso went into liquidation in 2004, although production of new cars continued after this date. By 2008, a buyer was being sought for the De Tomaso factory and trademarks, per the court-appointed liquidators. In 2009, Gian Mario Rossignolo bought the De Tomaso trademark and founded a new company named "De Tomaso Automobili SpA". Rossignolo planned to assemble chassis and bodies in one of Delphi Automotive's old production facilities in Livorno and to fit bodywork, paint and finish its cars in the former Pininfarina factory in Grugliasco.

In May 2012, De Tomaso was again for sale after their business plan failed to gather sufficient financial backing. In July 2012, Rossignolo was arrested following allegations that he misused 7.5 million Euro worth of government funds. In September 2012, speculation emerged that BMW might be interested in the brand factory to produce new BMW models.

In 2014, the original workshop in Modena was in abandonment.

In April 2015, an Italian bankruptcy court approved the sale of the company to Hong Kong–based Consolidated Ideal Team Ventures, for €1,050,000. Per that sale report "A lawyer for the buyer announced that Ideal Team Venture plans to produce cars in China bearing the De Tomaso name."

From Wikipedia’s article on De Tomaso, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4

Leadership

Who has led De Tomaso, and when. Pick a name to see everywhere that person has worked.

Products and brands

  • supercar

Listed on Wikidata.1

In the early 2000s two other cars were planned by De Tomaso, but both proved abortive. A two-seat Gandini-styled convertible, the Biguà, was developed from a 1996 Geneva concept in partnership with Qvale, an American firm which had long imported European sports cars into the USA. But as production of the Biguà—renamed the Mangusta—began, the relationship between De Tomaso and Qvale soured; Qvale took over the car and rebadged it as the Qvale Mangusta. Production was short-lived, and Qvale's Italian factory was bought in 2003 by MG Rover and the Mangusta's mechanicals were then used as the basis of the MG XPower SV. In April 2002, De Tomaso began a project to build off-road vehicles in a new factory in Calabria in partnership with the Russian company UAZ, but this too floundered. The deal projected a production rate of 10,000 cars a year by 2006: however, no cars were built and De Tomaso went into voluntary liquidation in June 2004 after the death of Alejandro de Tomaso in 2003. The Guarà remained available in some markets in 2005 and 2006, but it appears that no cars were built after 2004.

From Wikipedia’s article on De Tomaso, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4

Subsidiaries and ownership

Former owners and parents

From Wikidata.1

Acquisitions

  1. 1976Innocenti became a subsidiary1
  2. 1976Maserati became a subsidiary1
  3. 1973Moto Guzzi became a subsidiary1
  4. 1972Benelli became a subsidiary1

2009 acquisition

In 2009, the De Tomaso trademark was bought by Former Fiat executive Gian Mario Rossignolo who founded a new company named "De Tomaso Automobili SpA". A new business plan for the company called for producing three models for a total of 8,000 vehicles: 3,000 crossovers, 3,000 limousines, and 2,000 two-seater sports cars.

2011 De Tomaso Deauville

At the 2011 Geneva Motor Show, De Tomaso presented a new model. The new De Tomaso Deauville was to have been a five-door hatchback/crossover vehicle with all-wheel drive, which, in the details of its styling, quotes models from BMW and Mercedes-Benz.

The proposed range included two gasoline engines with 300 PS and 500 PS as well as a diesel from VM Motori with 250 PS. The Deauville remained a prototype, as the new company never started production and the company chairman, Rossignolo, was arrested in 2012 on account of misappropriation of funds taken from the Italian government to revive the De Tomaso brand. As a result, 900 employees of the company were made redundant. Rossignolo was sentenced to five and a half years of imprisonment on the charges of fraud and embezzlement in 2018.

2014 acquisition

The rights to the De Tomaso brand were acquired by Norman Choi of Ideal Team Ventures in 2014. The new management under Choi's leadership undertook the task of reviving the brand. Five years later, the company unveiled its first product, the P72 retro-styled sports car at the Goodwood Festival of Speed, at the time of 60th anniversary of the De Tomaso brand. The car had been in development under the code name of "Project P". The new car is based on the Apollo Intensa Emozione's monocoque chassis, a car manufactured by De Tomaso's sister company Apollo Automobil and 72 units of the car will be sold.

From Wikipedia’s article on De Tomaso, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4

Timeline

  1. 2019Founded Founded in Modena1
  2. 2012Dissolved Dissolved1
  3. 1971Acquired Acquired by Ford Motor Company1

Sources

The numbers on this page point here. Each one links to the record it came from.

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