“Creating extreme supercars and luxury cars with electric technology means thinking, elaborating and building a new industrial model and a new business culture“: introduces itself with these words Katia Bassi, managing director of Silk-FAW, the joint-venture owned by 85% of the American entrepreneur Jonathan Krane and 15% of the state-owned Chinese group FAW, which prepares to conquer the Motor Valley to the rhythm of battery-powered supersports. The activity of the new company will soon start in the heart of Reggio Emilia.
“At the beginning of April we will lay the foundation stone of the factory. It will be in the municipality of Gavassa, near the Reggio high-speed railway station. Now, here, we are 60. In June, we will be hiring another 160 specialists“, explains Bassi to the microphones of Il Sole 24 Ore. The joint-venture activity will be divided between the Emilian plant and a new plant that will be born in China: in Italy, there will be engineering, design and design, as well as the production of the S9, a hybrid hypercar in 400 units worth 2 million euros each, and the S7, an electric supercar to which an electric SUV will be added. Katia Bassi is a personality who will be very convenient to society, given her professional past spent in Ferrari. To retrace it is the same Bassi: “The first day I was called to Ferrari by Luca Cordero di Montezemolo I arrived in front of the factory very early. I immediately fell in love with these places and these people ”.
In addition to Ferrari, for whom he worked from 2001 to 2007 as head of stores, licensing and merchandising, the current managing director of Silk-FAW was also responsible for the non-core business activities of the Aston Martin for five years, before moving on to Lamborghini where it has contributed to making the brand more rounded and inclusive, with an effect not only of image, but also of identity and direct repercussions on sales, bringing purchases made by women from 3% to 11% of the total.
“The Silk-FAW Experience however, it is completely different – says Bassi – Not only because I have the overall responsibility of a project for which a factory, a research center and an office building will be built. Nor only because here we have personalities, among the interiors and collaborators, of great importance: one of the main car designers such as Walter De Silva and, later, managers such as Roberto Fedeli, Carlo Della Casa and Davide Montosi who have worked in key positions of Ferrari, McLaren and Lamborghini. But also because, in a project that by 2028 is worth a 1.3 billion euro investment and that in the next eighteen months provides for a loan of 400 million, the degree of complexity and unknown that must be addressed in software, artificial intelligence and materials is different from the traditional automotive industry “.
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