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The Hybrid-engine market represents today around 3% of the total automobile market in the world. As of April 2020, over 17 million hybrid electric vehicles have been sold worldwide since their inception in 1997. Japan itself has 7.5 million hybrid cars making this country the biggest country for this car segment. While hybrid cars are more and more fashionable due to planet issues, hybrid engines exist for a very longtime. For example, did you know that the first Porsche presented at the 1900 Universal Exhibition in Paris by Ferdinand Porsche had a hybrid engine? Flashback!
Ferdinand Porsche And His Fascination for Electricity
Ferdinand Porsche was born in Maffersdorf (Vratislavice nad Nisou) Bohemia, part of Austria-Hungary at that time, and today part of the Czech Republic. Ferdinand was his parents’ third child. His father was a master panel-beater. At a younger age, Ferdinand Porsche became passionate about electricity and showed a strong aptitude f
autoevolution
25 Years Ago, Porsche Put a Boxer in a Roadster Again and That Saved the Company 22 Jan 2021, 8:09 UTC ·
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It all started 30 years ago when the German carmaker was struggling financially. The gamble it took with the 928 was not paying off, with sales falling way below expectations; that meant that the future of the upcoming 968 wasn’t looking too bright either.
The aging 911 was barely keeping the company alive, so the head honchos decided to build a completely new mid-engine roadster that would replace the unsuccessful models while offering customers an affordable Porsche.
Combining the words ‘boxer’ and ‘roadster’, the creative minds in Stuttgart came up with the name Boxster. By the end of 1991, development had already begun, with engineers working on the powertrain and the design teams drawing up concepts of the bodywork.