Internationalisation - a once-a-century Chance

The political changes in Eastern Europe afforded a once-a-century chance for Porsche. In 1990 the Volkswagen AG commissioned Porsche to build up a distribution network for the marques of the Porsche Group in Hungary. On account of a rapid success in the market, the newly established Porsche Hungaria has contributed substantially to Porsche’s good reputation in that region. In addition to that, Porsche set up further retail dealerships in Bratislava and Prague, where they became authorized VW and Audi dealers. In 1993 Porsche won an importer’s contract for Slovakia, because as a consequence of splitting the country into a Czech and Slovak Republic the supply channels had broken down.

The disintegration of Yugoslavia and the ensuing war cut Slovenia off from the supply of VW and Audi models, which had so far been handled by the manufacturer’s importer in Sarajevo. After all the applications filed had been examined by the Volkswagen AG, Porsche was finally entrusted with the import business in Slovenia.

The Porsche Holding continued to act as a pioneer
building up distribution networks for the marques of the Volkswagen Group in the reform countries. The policy of long-term investment into these new markets was extended to Romania in 1997 and to Croatia (joint venture) in 1999. In the new millennium, the Porsche Holding became active in the automobile business in Serbia and Montenegro, in Bulgaria (2004), Albania and Macedonia (2005).

The Porsche Holding also managed to get a foothold in a highly exclusive market segment, by adding to their business the distribution of the marques Bentley (2000) and Lamborghini (2001) via the Exclusive Car Vertriebs GmbH in Vienna. In April 2006 the subsidiary became an authorized distribution partner of the Bugatti marque in Austria and in the South Eastern countries of Europe.