Porsche Chairman turns 75; “Wolfgang Porsche is the Figure with Whom People Identify Our Company”

Dr. Wolfgang Heinz Porsche turns 75 on 10 May 2018, having spent a monumental 40 years on the Supervisory Board of the sports car manufacturer, starting in 1978. Since 2007,  he has been the Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Porsche Automobil Holding SE and Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG, having influenced all major business decisions.

“Wolfgang Porsche is not only the bearer of our brand name, he is also the personable figure with whom people identify our company. He has always been there when needed. He has stood faithfully by the company, through the good times and the bad. For this, we admire him. For this, we hold him in esteem. For this, he deserves our full respect,” said Oliver Blume, Chairman of the Executive Board of Porsche AG.

Born in Stuttgart in 1943, Wolfgang is the youngest son of Ferry and Dorothea Porsche. His eldest brother Ferdinand Alexander Porsche, nicknamed “Butzi”, was the designer whose best known product was the first Porsche 911.

Hans Peter Porsche, Ferdinand Alexander Porsche, Gerhard Porsche, Dr Wolfgang Porsche, l-r, 550 Spyder, 1953, Porsche AG.

The first six and a half years of his life was spent on the “Schüttgut” estate in Zell am See, Austria, which belonged to his grandfather, Ferdinand Porsche. In 1950, the family returned to Stuttgart. Wolfgang graduated from the Odenwaldschule secondary school in 1965 and went on to study at the University of World Trade in Vienna, graduating with a degree in business administration. In 1973, he received his doctorate in commercial sciences. 

Thus began his profession as an independent entrepreneur, as a managing partner of JAMOTO, where he became a general importer for Yamaha motorcycles in Austria and Hungary. In 1976, he joined what was then Daimler-Benz AG in Stuttgart, where he worked for five years as a Sales Manager in various areas. In 1978, he was appointed to the Supervisory Board of Porsche AG, where he supported his father Ferry Porsche at the sports car company.

Following the death of his father in 1998, he was elected spokesman by the Porsche family. In the last few decades, he has been a key figure in the company’s major decisions, like the strategic realignment and reorganisation of Porsche AG in 1992, expansion of the product portfolio to encompass several new models and series such as the Boxster, Cayenne, Panamera, Macan plus the future electric sports car, the Mission E, as well as the investment in Volkswagen AG in 2005.

Wolfgang Porsche divides his time between Salzburg and the “Schüttgut” in Zell am See. He has four children and four grandchildren. In the Austrian province of Salzburg, he runs an Alpine organic farm home to around 200 cattle. Since his early youth, he has also demonstrated a passion for his company’s sports cars. Over the decades, this passion has given rise to a collection of rare Porsche vehicles that he drives regularly.