Maserati; A Different Italian Flavor!

Ferrari, Lamborghini and Pasta, the most dominating words that you can hear when you ask about the country Italy. Yes Italy is the home to many of the fast cars and mouth watering dishes, Italian cars and cuisine are some of the most exotic things that you can get around the globe. But if take a closer look there are other car manufacturers, than that of Ferrari and Lamborghini, who focuses on speed and power rather than comfort and practicality. But wait, there are other manufacturers too, who focuses on maybe kind of both luxury comfort and performance, just like that of the Germans, but the fact is that they are shadowed by the dominance of the bulls and prancing horses. Yes today let us discuss about the car with the three spears, another automaker from the land of pizza, the Maserati Automobili. Now talking about the vast history and the current position of the company will take a long time and will bore you so lets talk it through the main highlights.

The vast and eventful book of the Italian automaker got kick started from the early 1900, to be more accurate from the first December of 1914, The Maserati Brothers, Alfieri, Bindo Ettore and Ernesto planned to pile up their knowledge in car making and start making some cars. Something that they had, to be called as an experience was that for the three of them. Alfieri, Bindo, Ernesto used to build 2L GP cars for Diatto, an Italian automaker. They planned to add their brother Ettore after they were fired from Diatto as a result of the factory clampdown. This event which lead to the creation of the company took place in 1926. Initially they were in the search of a logo which were their primary concern. Finally they agreed to choose a logo based on the Fountain of Neptune, accepting a suggestion from their family friend Marquis Diego de Sterlich. For the Italians the symbol of Neptune meant strength and vigor, also it symbolized the hometown of Maserati. Tragedy struck the Maserati brothers for the first time in 1932 when Alfieri died, but the rest of the brothers kept the firm running until after five years when they transferred the ownership to Alfodo Orisi. Three years went by without much notable highlights but in 1940 the company saw the first wave of change incoming when Orsi relocated the company headquarters to their hometown, Modena 

Things were going as smooth as it could be until when the call for the World War 2 came. The call for WW2 forced the company to swap production. They had to reorganize the facility to make weapons and they were forced to abandon automotive manufacturing. But after a while when the dust of the war was cleared Maserati came back with their cars. Their first pre war model was the Maserati A6 series, and the post war period turned out to be one of the biggest turning points in the entire history of Maserati. Alberto Massimino, a fiat engineer with some italian pedigree from Alfa Romeo and Ferrari joined the team Maserati, some more talented engineers who were capable of working out magic like Giulio Alfeiri, Vittoro Bellentani, Giacchio Colombo followed Alberto to Maserati. Alberto, with the team focused on making the best engines and chassis, the most important and influential part of a car. With the team, the company began tasting the champagne of success and one of their most successful models were the A6GCS. These models saw the Maserati brothers giving out their last contributions to the company, the brothers made their last contributions to the models like 4CLT, 8CLT, A6 series etc. 

But after almost 30 years of collaboration Alfodo Osiri transferred the ownership to the famous french company the Citroen Automotive. Event though the ownership was given, Alfodo remained as the nominal president of Maserati, but the company was controlled by the new owner and the joint venture was made public on the January of 1968. The joint venture was in favor for both companies in many ways, while Maserati tasted the essence of the french tech from Citroen for their models, Citroen made use of the powerful and exotic Italian engines from Maserati. And the first Citroen model having the Italian powerhouse rolled out of the assembly line in 1970 in the name of Citroen SM, an essential front wheel drive coupe, which came packed with the Maserati V6 and gearbox. SM shared the underpinnings with some of the rally racing icons like the Citroen DS and many more. Meanwhile on the other side Maserati made use of the french experts in hydraulic suspension, and their first model under the Citroen ownership was the Maserati Indy, a four seater fast back Grand tourer, packing the traditional V8 drivetrain which rolled out in 1969, and that was just a start of what followed, a total of 1.1K Indys rolled out of the assembly in the following years. 1971 saw Maserati taking the cover of their first mid-engined series production model, the Bora, which is essentially the first road legal Maserati to be made. Maserati made the 4 door version of the Citroen SM as the Quatteroporte II. But only a dozen of those cars were made and those who were made came with the Maserati V6 and took the front wheel drive mid engined layout and 6 headlight arrangement from the SM.

But then the Italian marquee saw one of the violent storms hitting them right in the head, which was in the form of 1973 oil crisis. The oil crisis put the breaks to the ambitious and fast pace expansion of the company which turned out to be a big backlash for them. The high price for fuel made the public rethink about their choice of cars to cope up with the newly arisen living financial conditions. The popularity for the fuel hungry sports car with big fat block engines went down very fast which affected every super-car manufacturers. Following the lead of the fuel crisis then came the financial black hole which took down Citroen in the form of bankruptcy. This made the guys at the headquarters think about the new allegation which lead to the formation of Peugeot Citroen Allegation or the PSA group. But that did not go as planned and in 1975 Citroen put up Maserati into liquidation. As the news spread around it created havoc and commotion and the work force picketed the factory. And the liquidation was suspended by the PSA group after they received a request from the Italian government. But the fact was that even under all these chaos and commotion the production was not interrupted and the factory was fully functional.

By the august of 1975, according to the agreement made with the Italian government which lead to the halt of the liquidation, Citroen passed the properties of Maserati to an Argentinian industrialist and former racing driver Alejandro De Tomaso, who later became the president and CEO of the Italian automobile marquee. The very first thing De Tomaso did was kicking off Alfieri form his position on the company and Tomaso did it on the very first day if taking his charge. After a while when all these financial commotions and the transfer of ownership chaos came to an end Maserati began producing fresh batches of cars under the leadership of De Tomaso. And the specialty of the new models was that it shared underpinnings with the De Tomaso models which was not at all surprising thing. But the fact was that the new owners were not able to create the highly anticipated bang on numbers. Even though it was not as massive as expected however it was able to create its won impact on the big life story of Maserati. Under De Tomaso Maserati made a big gamble by abandoning mid engined sports cars and front engined rear wheel drive cars replaced them on the charts. They replaced the iconic V8s with twin turbo V6 which lead to the creation of the bi-turbo family.

At 1984 Chrysler bought 5% share on Maserati which was the first step towards the joint venture which took place after a short while. As a result of the Maserati Chrysler merging the new models came out with a Chrysler touch. For example they renewed the ageing Quattroporte and reintroduced it as the Royale, with some serious bits of luxury just like the name suggests. But the bi-turbo era didnt last so long and it was wrapped up in 1990. And when it was gone they took down every single bit of the era. When the Bi-Turbo bid farewell to the market it took with it the legendary Maserati V8 which is the Maserati quad cam V8 and the name bi-turbo was dropped altogether. T he last Bi-Turbo coupe was called racing and it was practically a test mule for the new kid on the block, the iconic Maserati Ghibli. The Racing bi-turbo coupe tested many features which were to be loaded to the Ghibli. The year 1989 saw De Tomaso and Fiat making deals which when made became one of the iconic hand shakes of the history. In the December of 1989 Fiat says hello to the Italian automaker and the rest was history. This collaboration gave way to the introduction of some of the iconic models like Brachetta. After a short while De Tomaso packed the bags and left the group leaving Fiat and Maserati alone. When he left, De Tomaso sold about 51% stakes to Fiat auto group and in 1994 the Italian company rolled out their first model under the new leadership of Fiat. The new model was the latest generation of the Quatteroporte, the Quatteroporte IV. In the new update it packed some bi-turbo underpinnings and Gadini styling and the V6 from the Ghibli II was packed under the hood. After acquiring 51% shares from De Tomaso, Fiat purchased Maserati from Chrysler which put a n end to the short term partnership from Chrysler and Maserati.

In the July of 1997, Fiat sold 50% of the share, that is 1% less than that of what they got from De Tomaso, to the most iconic rivals of Maserati from their own home town, Ferrari. Two years flew by and in 1999, under the leadership of Fiat, Ferrari took the full control of the Italian automakers and as a result there were a few things happening around. The transition was pretty calm and quiet because there was nothing to be bluffed about as both companies were under the same umbrella. What Ferrari did for the first time was replacing the then outdated 1940s factory with a something new which made all the change with all the new age technology and equipments. With all the new facilities, tech and equipment, the company was ready to rock and roll again. All these changes brought out a fresh and improvised Quatteroporte to the market and the new one has a name added to the tail, something that is common with the new age Ferrari's. The revamped Quatteroporte was named as Quatteroporte Evoluzone. 1998 can be classified among one of the warm years as per the Maserati history because, a new chapter has began on the vast book of Maserati from 1998. It was when the company rolled out their two door coupe with a twin turbo V8 under the hood in the name of Maserati 3200 GT. And within four years the last links to De Tomaso broke, that was in 2002. It was when the 3200 GT got successors in the names Maserati Coupe and Spyder. Both had the naturally aspirated Dry Sump 4.2L V8 paired with a trans axle gearbox.  Later the day both of these Coupe and Spyder Got replaced with th Grand Turesmo and Grand Cabrio respectively. By 2001 Ferrari refurnished and refreshed their production house at Modena and gave it the new generation and high tech devices and equipment. After refreshing the production house at their home, Maserati went to the States, the fact was that, what they wanted to do was just initiate the programs at the states and every thing followed was massive for the company. The demand for the Tradient badge cars skyrocketed and within a short period of time they ruled the market of their home.

The year 2005 saw the two home grown rivals break up, Ferrari and Maserati broke up and parted ways with. When Ferrari broke up, Maserati went on a date with another Italian automaker with the name Alfa Romeo who was under the same group of Fiat. Since both the groups were under the same umbrella, all the transaction and the allegations were under the control of Fiat group just like in the case of Ferrari allegation. Under the new allegation Maserati resumed production with a new spirit and by the first week of June 2005, they rolled out their 20,000th car, a Quatteroporte VI rolled out of the assembly line. Two years of their restless hard work made the results and in 2007 Maserati made their first profit after a massive gap of a decade and 7 years under the leadership of Fiat group. In 2010 Fiat made an official announcement that they have created a new brand groups for the brands under them, it was specifically fir the three companies, Maserati, Alfa Romeo and their own performance wing, the Abarth Group. But within a while Abarth left the chat and went back under the parent company laving Maserati and Alfa Romeo in the group. Even though Alfa and Maserati were under the same umbrella they stayed different and had their own identity among the group. This was made clear by the statement from the leader of the pack Weseter. He quoted that Alfa Romeo and Maserati were different and Alfa is the latter better integrated with Fiat. He made it clear for the fact that alfa romeo will not share any parts with Maserati. After the dust of this incident cleared up Maserati began their own independent expansion and increase in production. The flagship of the Maserati pack was the Quatteroporte VI followed by the introduction of Ghibli. This two models locked horns with the German veterans of the game, Mercedes Benz and BMW.

By the spirit of expansion, Maserati revisited their long gone nostalgia, the high performance field. With their re entry they planned to fight with the German veterans BMW-M and Mercedes-AMG. What they did was pack their flagship models, the Quatteroporte VI, Levante and Ghibli with the V8s churning out 526 HP and an All Wheel Drive, which made the rivals rethink about their models capabilities. From 2013 the graph and every other things began turning in favor of the Italian automaker. Sales graph began moving up and it was just like the rapid acceleration from a Tesla model S Plaid it just rocketed up to the top. In that year they rolled out 15400 units from the assembly line which is 6000 units from that of the previous year. And the next year they rolled about double the times the units they did last year recording as high as 36500 Maserati cars running around the globe. The year they recorded a Herculean increase in their sale, about 136% from that of 2013. From an analysis the officials of Maserati found that the best soil for them to flourish was the American soil as they topped the production charts on the States. From then until now they are growing up and above with wide variety of models in the lineup.

During the first quarter of 2022 Maserati has produced an announcement that they are planning to produce an electric alternative for all the models existing in their lineup hence constituting their part to the global energy crisis and fuel shortage. They said by the report that this mission is planned to be completed by 2025, they also said that there will be a separate wing for their electric vehicle segment called the foglore which when spoken in Italian means Lightning. I am a bit suspicious about that name, yeah something is fishy.

Now lets just go through some of the iconic Maserati models which rolled out of the assembly line with a bang. The Current lineup of the Italian automaker comprises of two SUV's within which one is a coupe, one luxury sedan, one sports sedan and one super sports car and its roofless sibling. The first and the foremost comes the Quatteroporte, one of the eldest player of the game. The Quatteroporte was a four door luxury sedan from the Italian house and the name, when said in the mother tongue, translates to four doors, yes the name means simply four doors. The Quatteroporte played a long game on the field with its generations stretching from the first to number six. The very first one or the great ancestor rolled out of the factory back in 1963, the assembly took place at the Modena facility in the hometown, Italy. The latest generation, the 6th one started production from 2013.

The second model is the Maserati Ghibli, a sports executive saloon which locked horns with the Germans, BMW M5, Mercedes E Class and Audi A6. The Ghibli broke the cover at the 2013 Shanghai motor-show. The same year, officials waved green flags for the production and the production got underway later that year, and, is not until now given the chequered flag. The Ghibli underpins the Maserati M-150 platform and under the hood it was given two banging packages, V6 and V8 engines on different variants. The funny fact was that the base model, which was supposed to be just the body, frame and chassis turned out to be packed with a punch of 330 horses. Talking about some power figures, by 2018 Ghibli was given 20 more horses. The birthplace of Ghibli is another town in Italy called Turin, the facility of Turin was where the assembly of Ghibli took place.

Now comes the Maserati Levante, a mid size cross over SUV with added bits and pieces of luxury and comfort. The Maserati Levante was introduced to the automotive world in 2014. Before getting introduced, this model, the Levante was highly anticipated after the introduction of Maserati Kubang SUV Concept which was taken cover off at the 2003 Frankfurt motor-show and was showcased again at the 2011. after three years in 2014 the officials waved green flag for production works to get going. Getting put into order in the Mirafiori plant of Turin, Italy. The car was named after the warm easterly wind that constantly visits the western Mediterranean sea. Under the hood, this thing had a V6 spitting out either 350 or 425 hp according to the state of tunes.

Next on the line is the twins from the lineup, the Maserati Grand Cabrio and Grand Turesmo. Even with two different surnames, the grand cabrio and grand turesmo are essentially one and the same car but the only difference that made both cars significant is that one has a fixed roof and the other has a removable roof. Both packs the 4.7 V8 under the hood churning out 454 horses and underpins the Maserati M139 platform. The Grand Turesmo is, as the name suggests a grand tourer introduced to the world in 2007 and was on production from 2017 till 2019.

For us the next contestant in line is the Maserati MC 20. As the name says, the MC 20 is another two door mid-engined super sports car made form the Italian soil. The MC 20 broke the cover in 2020. It featured a carbon fibre moncoque chassis and by introduction the company also announced the fully calibrated sports variant of the MC 20 which is yet to come, but there was something new that was introduced in the name of Maserati Celio, a drop top version of the Maserati MC 20 which had something more of a luxury touches. apart from featuring a Carbon fibre monocoque chassis, the MC 20 packed the punch of almost 620 horses from a 3 liter V6. Something that can be considered as an exotic and expensive package.

Legacy on the Motorsports is something that the tradiant marquee can always brag about. The Maserati Automobili was an active participant in all the Motorsports racing forms ranging from the great daddy, Formula 1 to Touring championships. Through the long time participation Maserati was able to present to the world some notable drivers like Juan Manual Fangio, the five time world champion and Prince Bira of Siam. Throughout the years in Motorsports, Maserati developed 15 GT race-cars for several series like the European Cup and naturel endurance series.

Now comes one of the most relevant topic that is a question any where and everywhere nowadays, will this company do anything in favor of the environmentalists. As the report goes, the answer for the question turns out to be yes and they will be coming up with some of the out of the world concepts and many of the electrified versions of their models in the current lineup, which is something that I have mentioned earlier. Lets keep our fingers crossed and wait for each one to arrive to the field. Maserati, even though grown under the shadow of famous Italian automakers like Lamborghini and Ferrari, is now a brand with its own signature in the automotive industry.