The Bertone Barchetta, which the Italian company unveiled last year
The trend of Indian companies wanting to buy out European ones continues, with Mahindra & Mahindra looking at picking up a stake in Italian company, Stile Bertone. Renowned worldwide for its automotive design prowess, Stile Bertone has designed cars for car manufacturers like Ferrari, Lamborghini and Alfa Romeo.
Stile Bertone has worked on some design aspects of certain M&M utility vehicles, and the two company have had close business ties for some time. And while there is no confirmation from M&M executies, the company is widely believed to be interested in picking up an equity stake in SB, which will help its own automotive design capabilities, as well as allow it to take on contract work from other manufacturers.
In an interesting aside, M&M has already acquired another Turin-based design company – GR Grafica – which was acquired by Mahindra Graphic Research & Design, the Italian arm of M&M. The acquisition of Stile Bertone, if it does happen, will only add to M&M’s design capabilities, which could be extremely useful for the company.
