The war of the manufactures

At the end of last week Ducati hit the motorsport headlines, not for the reason you'd assume necessarily. The first thing that springs to mind would be a new bike in production or the Ducati MotoGP team but it was to do with the company itself.

If you've been living under a rock this past week then you might not know that Ducati got sold to Audi. 

Audi's 'parent company' the Volkswagen group owns car brands such as Lamborghini, Seat, Bugatti, Skoda and as i mentioned Audi. One thing these manufactures have in common is that they are considered to be 'sport' cars.

Why Ducati?

Founded in 1926 by brothers Bruno, Marcello and Adriano Ducati from Bologna, Italy. It's one of the world's most recognisable bike company; the Ferrari of the Motorbike world.

Ducati is one of the few manufactures that produce road motorbikes as well as competing and being participants in motor racing series such as MotoGP which it re-joined (after a 30 year absence from the sport) in 2003, the British Superbike Championship and the AMA Superbike championship. It's also the most successful manufacture in the history of World Superbike's and won last year's title with Althea's Carlos Checa.

Ducati also produce their own engine's however with only 10% (i say only, it's quite a lot really) of Ducati's revenue being pumped in to racing, Ducati also have other non-motorbike related products such as radios, camera's and electricals. All in all Ducati are a well rounded company that offers a lots of potential so why wouldn't a big car brand like Audi want to own it?  Having Ducati on board means they can branch out to motorcycle's.

However, this means it's bye-bye for Mercedes-Benz AMG. Their partnership was formed in 2010 and although relatively new, Mercedes and Audi/Volkswagen are rival car manufactures which means their relationship was bound to end. AMG said that they had no interest in taking over Ducati and their partnership with the Italian company was about 'producing premium performance cars' and that is what they still focus on, though obviously not with Ducati anymore.

A fine example of the cut-throat, competitive world of the motor industry.

In other news MotoGP will be happy to hear Valentino Rossi has repeatedly said he'll not be leaving Ducati in the lurch, he will not be leaving Ducati (for this season at least) Vale, i suggest you repeat it a few more times to truly banish the rumours!

With a rainy first day day in Jerez, let's hope it clears up for the rest of the weekend. Qualifying Saturday and the race on Sunday (all three classes) don't miss it!!