About Alfa Romeo Cars
Alfa Romeo was initially founded as A.L.F.A. (Anonima Lombarda Fabbrica Automobili) meaning Lombard Automobile Factory, Public Company on June 24 1910 in Milan, Italy. In 1915, Neapolitan Nicola Romeo, who was a maths teacher, took over the management of the company and converted the factory to start making military equipment.
Alfa Romeo has been heavily involved in the car racing world since 1911 and has won competitions ever since the launch of their first 24 HP model car in 1910. This car raced in the Sicilian Targa Florio competition and continued to race all over Europe. Alfa Romeo competed in the Motorsport world to critical acclaim and success, including racing in the Grand Prix motor circuits and Formula 1. They competed as both a constructor and an engine supplier.
In 1920, the company changed its name to Alfa Romeo. The first racing car made by Alfa Romeo was in 1913, and they won the inaugural world championship in 1925. In 1923, Enzo Ferrari founded the Scuderia Ferrari racing team, which was known as the Alfa Romeo racing team.
As well as a huge success on the racetrack Alfa Romeo also saw huge success in car sales helped by their performance on the racetrack, however, they did not see any economic growth and sadly after fifty years they were purchased by Finmeccanica S.p.A.so as to avoid bankruptcy. In 1928 Nicola Romeo left the company and in 1933 they continued to struggle after the war and instead started to manufacture in large quantities, small vehicles rather than handmade luxury models.
In 1952 they produced their first front-wheel drive car "known as Project 13-61" During the late 1950s they planned on making the Tipo 103 which was to be a smaller version of the Alfa Romeo Giulia but sadly due to financial difficulties in post-war Italy, it never saw production. In 1954 the company developed the Alfa Romeo Twin Cam engine and this remained in production until 1998.
During the 1960s and 70s Alfa Romeo produced many sports-type cars, through the Italian company, Finmeccanica, however, they sadly struggled to make any profit from the venture and so had to sell the marque in 1986 to the Fiat Group. During this period in the 1960s they made the GTA that had a twin-plug engine and this won The Sports Car Club of America's Trans-Am championship in 1966. In the 1970s they made the Tipo 33, and the Tipo 33TT12 that won the World Championship for Makes in 1975.
Models produced from the 1990s include many more sports cars, including the Brera, and the 8C Competizione. From 1995 Alfa Romeo stopped exporting cars to the United States and the last model sold was the 164.
Alfa Romeo recently has been suffering from low sales and in the mid-2000s it was reported that around 15 per cent of their annual revenue was lost. It was announced in 2013 that Alfa Romeo wanted to re-enter the American market with the 4C, however, this has now been postponed until 2015 while they focus on producing more mainstream models.