The Good Guys Always Win!!?????

In 1931 Mr. Hans Ledwinka made an honest mistake which changed the automotive industry dramatically, he basically had shown his latest design “T77” to his best (so called) friend; his latest design T77 for “Nesselsdorfer Wagenbau-Fabriksgesellschaft” (now known as TATRA Trucks a.s. in Czech Republic) was a revolutionary in its day, aerodynamic (known then in 1930’s Streamline) , overhead valves, fully independent suspension, rear wheel drive, Air-Cooled Engine located at rear (instead of front) , extensive lightweight Magnesium Alloy used in Engine/ transmissions / suspension/body and fully Luxury sedan with top speed of 150km/h. Unfortunately for Mr. Ledwinka , his Friend copied T77 design terribly and put it into production under the name of Volkswagen (VW) Type 1 also known as VW Beatle in 1936; yes you quest it right!!! That friend was none other than Mr. Ferdinand Porsche. When VW came to the market, it was instantly a hit and right away Tatra took VW to the court in late 1936; tragically for TATRA when Nazi Germany Invaded Czechoslovakia in 1938, the court proceedings got halted, and TATRA company fallen into Nazi ownership; At the same time, TATRA was forced to stop producing all passenger Cars including T77 and just Military trucks were allowed. The court proceeding matter was re-opened after World War II and finally in 1965 Volkswagen paid Tatra 1 Million Deutsche Marks in an out-of-court settlement. Sadly for Mr. Hans Ledwinka, after the war he was jailed and finally he died in total poverty in Munich 1967. Luckily for his friend, after the War he start producing sport version of Beetle under his name “Porsche” and he also received royalty fees on all Volkswagen Beetles manufactured since 1936; Nonetheless no Porsche models nor VW Beetles produced in Sedan till 2010, we could say that Porsche Panamera, is a modern realization of T77 after 80 years of its initial concept. The lesson we could earn from this story is that: just being a simply good engineer/innovator is not enough you must know how present/sell/protect your ideas, “WE” all could be either ” a Ledwinka or a Porsche” !!! That would be our decisions.

Author By: Reza Djalili
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