Luckily this passion for cars is also a passion for art, for engineering, for mechanics, it all began when I was a child, but there’s not a specific moment that I can remember, but I began to think about these things as I was around 6 or 7 years old.
I started to draw and my mother is a painter, so at home there was an artistic atmosphere. My mother also played the piano, my father liked jazz, so let’s say that the arts had a strong presence at home and this of course was important.
When I was younger, around 13 or 14 years old, I thought about what I was going to study, what university I would attend and it wasn’t easy because I really liked the sciences, so because of that I was fascinated by the dynamics of cars.
And this lead me to study mechanical and nautical engineering, but in the meantime I also liked art, design, so I also wanted to study art and industrial design, too.
And there was this big confusion because I wanted to study both of these disciplines.
One day I received the best luck in the world when I had a magazine in my hands that wrote about the life of Leonardo da Vinci.
And in this magazine there was a phrase that I’ve always remembered and has played an important role in my life and the company
Leonardo in the Renaissance, so about 500 years ago, claimed that art and science can walk together hand in hand and so when I read this saying from Leonardo it opened a new window for me to a world that I wanted to explore.
And to be specific to the question that you asked me, everybody that works here at Pagani, all my colleagues have all followed this philosophy, Leonardo’s philosophy.
So let’s say to put that into our work, in every single thing that we do, the artistic component and the art that comes from within, from our hands.
This expression of the hands, these thoughts of the mind, in this journey through the heart, and the hands follow everything through this manual intellectuality.
This is exactly what my colleagues and our partners try to do, we try to process this philosophy into reality.
For us it has to be a beautiful object, an object which communicates something. And this forms the basis of the 5,000 parts that make a car. Let’s say it’s our mission to create pieces of art in all respects of the word.
I always wanted to think in this way in this line of profession. Let’s say that we try to give 120% when we work.
When we are talking about putting in only 90%, there are of course technical and aesthetic aspects of the car that need more work.
With the Huayra it was a very long process. I mean just the designing process alone so the aesthetic work of the car took 5 years, when normally the process only takes about a year or so.
And in these 5 years we had the opportunity to study the route we wanted to take with the car, to make 8 or 9 models, to create 2 models of the car instead of just 1
So with this being the case we worked very hard to perfect it. When we saw the end result we were very happy with it still today and we were satisfied with the work we did.
When we start a journey to make something for our customers, the mission is to take our time with every aspect.
So with every car we make it has a history, a story behind it. And for every car we aim to incorporate a new layer to it, a sort of spirit or a soul of the customer. So the cars we make aren’t just made for our satisfaction.
With every car we make we try to really move and inspire our customers. In short we’re trying to make cars that make a customer feel like the car was made especially and exclusively for them.
I have to say that after all these years working on the Huayra we are now finally behind that journey.
It’s true that you do have to think about the future, because in 2003 we had the Zonda alongside other cars such as the
Bugati Veyron, Boscarella GT, the SLR Mercedes, Maserati MC 12 and the Ferrari Enzo, you know all these extraordinary cars from the 2000s.
It was a superb decade for the supercar world. And at the time we were thinking about a car for the future and when we came up with the concept for the Huayra we wanted to it to be completely different from the Zonda.
We wanted it to be completely different its concept, the mechanics, everything different.
We have come to realize however that even today the Zonda is a car that people talk about, because in 2013 it will be 10 years since I thought that the Zonda was already an old car and it’s still alive and kicking.
I mean when you think about its performance, its safeness, it will always be a car to talk about, also because of its construction and makeup of course
And the Huayra is a car that expresses so many new concepts, such as its design and the way it was built, the suspension, its safety, dynamics
we stepped outside the box and looked for new ideas to be incorporated into the car. Because of this the process of course was long and lasted over 7 years.
We see however in this car’s mechanical aspects that there’s an enormous possibility for future technological growth and development.
I must say that today when I look at the Zonda I think that of course its concepts, its suspension are still today original, but there is always room for improvement
and for this reason I think that the Huayra in terms of its technology is 10 years ahead of the Zonda. Because
and only because of this reason because I don’t want to slate the Zonda we were able to work in tranquility with the Huayra, unlike the Zonda where we had to focus more on success and proving ourselves.
We are aware that we don’t have the ability or knowledge to be able to create an engine I mean of course today the Pagani company is well integrated into the car production world
but the procedures you need to endure to do so is extremely complicated and it’s necessary to be able to work and collaborate with a big manufacturer
a manufacturer that allows us to make huge developments which can be very expensive, a manufacturer that is known for its engineering expertise.
I think the Zonda’s engine in terms of 12 cylinder engines was and still is extraordinary because this Mercedes-built engine was advanced and very ahead of its time.
And even though we also have the Mercedes engines of the S class and the SL, it’s like the heart and soul of the Zonda and even today it is an engine which was built with such high standards.
I have to say that I was very lucky because even as a kid I was in love Mercedes, so I guess you could say that I always have respect for them and wanted to work with them and the Mercedes AMG is a dream for me
The Huayra’s engine is also extraordinary because it’s very light, very low and the performance of it is almost electric.
So I think in the future and I am not disrespecting other Italian car manufacturers such as Lamborghini because I love its brand and the technology that comes with it and that goes for Ferrari as well but I think that we will continue to use Mercedes’ technology and continue to work with them and develop our cars further.
With this is mind we of course have to start thinking about electric cars, because they are state-of-the-art cars that are becoming more and more talked about and have a certain priority now over normal cars.
In terms of supercars they are cars you need for the race track and not necessarily for the road.
I think that this way of doing things is the right solution and that the company made a good decision by working with Mercedes.
Perhaps it is now better to start being more realistic with our cars and become more concerned with the environment
and the amount of co2 emissions polluting the planet rather than trying to make a car that will drive faster than 320 km per hour.
So of course in the future Pagani will be studying all the technology possible to try and make electric cars a possibility for the future.
We have great partnerships with companies who are working hard at developing great electronic technology and figuring out how to apply it in the most suitable way to the market.
So of course electric cars will in the future be a dream for the Pagani family.
I don’t think that we are ready at the moment to start developing electric cars and we still need to develop further the technology for more efficient cars before we completely dismiss our traditional cars of the past.
In terms of the electronic car, of course it should be something that we will look into in the future. Right now, 92 % of our energy comes from petroleum. Only 8% or 9% are from alternative resources.
However, I do feel that it is far too early for Pagani to begin providing electronic or hybrid cars; because I think that the battery technology needs to be a lot better.
At this moment in time it’s not wise for us to begin developing electric cars. Because the weight of the battery will of course influence the weight of a car.
Today the central part of the production is based on petroleum and carbon and there a deposits of that around the country.
If we use alternate resources until now we cannot go that far with this. 20 kilometers for example is the radius.
Furthermore an electronic car weights lot more than an ordinary car, for example the brakes. So it will be a long process and not something that can be done overnight.
So not only the battery but the whole car costs us a lot at this moment. And a lot more than a ordinary car.
This therefore does not please the public, as they do not want to spend too much money on an electric car when they can spend a lot less money on a normal one.
So because of this the technology definitely needs to be improved a lot more before Pagani can implement it into our cars.
If you think about mobile phones for example, the first ever had a huge battery that wasn’t very efficient .Nowadays however our mobile phones have a very small battery which are much more efficient and can be used a lot more.
This is simply because of more research into mobile phone technology and the long period of time over which the technology was developed and improved, so this is the same thing which is occurring with electric cars and the battery engine.
A lot of people want most sources of co2 emissions to be removed by 2020 and that only a small quantity of traditional cars will be left on the road.
But if you think about it, this is a huge dream which can only be made into a reality if the technology behind it is improved first
we cannot simply jump straight ahead with electric cars without proper development and planning. The battery simply must be improved before we do that.
Think about how many people in the world are dying of hunger, over 20 to 30 million people in Africa and all over the world, they are battling with starvation.
Combine that with how many people are emitting co2 emissions, it is obviously going to be a huge number a much larger number.
Mercedes are putting in all their efforts to try and reduce the amount of co2 emissions that their traditional cars produce.
All car manufacturers are studying these technologies and making sure that they invest more and more resources into the future of cleaner driving.
You have to understand that they have already done a great job and are continuing to do so.
We are however still a long way away from an electric future. If you think about our supercars though if they drive around 45,000 km a year and you have to think that’s only 30 or 40 cars a year. 0:22:56.000,0:23:13.000 The supercars from Ferrari, Lamborghini, are these cars polluting the world? I honestly don’t think that are, and that’s how I see it.