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Gumpert Was Allegedly Bought by Hong Kong Company

Take this with a grain of salt, but it seems that German sportscar company Gumpert was acquired by a group of foreign investors from Hong Kong.
Gumpert Apollo 1 photo
Photo: GUMPERT Sportwagenmanufaktur GmbH
The supercar manufacturer filed for bankruptcy in 2012, after a potential investor backed out of a deal meant to save the company. According to an unnamed source quoted by GTSpirit, the group of new investors consists of clients of Hong Kong’s SPS Automotive Performance. That particular company is an exotic car workshop in the country, so we can only assume its customers have a level of financial power that could support a supercar manufacturer.

The Gumpert company only made one model, the Apollo. Although the car wasn’t a flop in terms of sales, the company failed to gather profit from its manufacture and eventually went bankrupt. The Gumpert Apollo was only made for seven years and was designed by Roland Mayer and Roland Gumpert, the latter being the company’s founder.

Mr. Gumpert used to be an engineer working for Audi, where he led the development of the company’s famed quattro all-wheel-drive system. He was also involved in Audi Sport’s motorsport success.

Initially, the company was founded with the support of Audi and its designs were perfected with the help of the students from the Universities of Munich and Ingolstadt. The latter helped the guys at Gumpert with wind tunnel tests, prototype construction, computer-aided simulations and other development stages.

Gumpert offered three power levels for its Apollo: 650 HP, 700 HP and 800 HP, values more than reasonable even in today’s world. The engine responsible for these figures was a bi-turbo V8 unit sourced from Audi. The 4.2-liter power plant was heavily modified to suit the needs of a supercar and featured dry sump lubrication, sequential multi-port fuel injection, and hydraulic valve clearance compensation.

The result was a “no-compromise” car ready to race but suitable for the road. Too bad the original company didn’t make it financially and suffered the fate of other exotic carmakers.
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About the author: Sebastian Toma
Sebastian Toma profile photo

Sebastian's love for cars began at a young age. Little did he know that a career would emerge from this passion (and that it would not, sadly, involve being a professional racecar driver). In over fourteen years, he got behind the wheel of several hundred vehicles and in the offices of the most important car publications in his homeland.
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