Bugatti's new era begins with the arrival of the long-awaited Tourbillon hyper-GT, which replaces the Chiron with a dramatic new look, a radical hybridised V16 engine and a target to become the world's fastest road car.
Named for the tiny mechanism that maintains accuracy in high-end watches, the Tourbillon arrives exactly 20 years after the launch of the Veyron, which was the most powerful road car of its time.
That car's successor, the Bugatti Chiron, launched in 2016 and has now ended production at the firm's Molsheim factory in France, in preparation for the new car to be built from 2026.
Just 250 units will be produced, with a starting price of £3.2 million - making this the most expensive new car in 'series' production.
Bugatti CEO Mate Rimac refers to the Tourbillon as "art on wheels, a moving painting", and says he wanted to continue the company's legacy of "bending physics".
While the Tourbillon will obviously be a highly limited and expensive proposition, he acknowledged the huge profile of the Bugatti brand and the influence it can have outside of its core customer base: "We will not change the life of everybody but everyone can be inspired."
When Rimac acquired Bugatti in 2021, the French firm was in the early development phase for an "electric coupé-SUV type of thing", he said, but he "thought that was absolutely wrong for the brand."
"Luckily, I won that argument", he grinned, at the unveiling of his new 16-cylinder hypercar, touting the 'emotional' appeal of a low-slung silhouette and a huge engine.
"We wanted to have it very emotional. It has to feel special, because 'if it is comparable, it is no longer Bugatti'," he added, referencing the slogan of company founder Ettore Bugatti.
Powertrain
The Tourbillon takes an appropriately outlandish approach to electrification, dropping the behemoth W16 motor which powered the Chiron and Veyron for a 1775bhp plug-in hybrid arrangement centred around a screaming naturally aspirated V16 in the middle.
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What percentage of these will be driven around London? What percentage of children in England are living in poverty? Fucking gross.
What a boring little Planet this would be if the ideals of some of us were actioned, it's a small tiny percentage compared to the pollution created by the likes of you and I every day, why not an all ICE Vehicles from city centres or densely populated areas?,wouldnt that be better for the people?, and anyway, if I could afford to run a car like this,I'm not going to buy just because you think it's wrong, how would you react if you were told you can't do or have your favourite thing?, the percentage of of cars like this around the planet must be tiny compared to all other forms of transport,and that includes land , sea and air.
Personally I'd sooner the billionaires spend their money on expensive things, pay the VAT and wages of the engineers and workers in the Bugatti factory than leave it in the bank for fear of offending anyone. Posters and models of this car will inspire some kids to be the next generation of designers. Likely some mainstream benefits from the new tech developed for this - the 'organic' AI-designed suspension arms for example. I don't find 250 of these that offensive.
I'm sure some pure child in absolute poverty in Asia/Africa is also thinking the same about you as you have your house, food, safety, car, holiday, computer, luxury items (basically anything more than physical need....) It's all relative.
No, it's not all relative. You and me buying a few things isn't the same as a few hundred people holding 20% or 30% of the world's ealth, while 20 or 30% live in poverty. You and I can't stop people starving. They can but they buy these pieces of shit instead.
Envy and jealously.
You do know they print more money every day? It's not a limited resource. Nobody standing next to you worth a bit of money or more is stopping you from doing anything you want to do. There may be other things stopping you, but it's not because someone else is richer than you. Or poorer.
Jealous of what? I do alright. It's called human empathy, ya useless wad. As for the rest of your inane drivel, a high school economics student could tear it apart.
Yawn. You really think they sit around is castles with bags of gold.
Their wealth is on paper - shares in the businesses they (or their parents) built if they liquidated it (or it got super taxed away) it ceases to exist. There's nobody to buy assets if all the people with them are selling. It will literally diappear before your eyes.
But hey, keep up the envy and judgement whilst doing NOTHING yourself. And no, £10 a month to one of those sprawling 5 minute ads on daytime TV doesn't count.
You normally write thoughtful and insightful comments which I enjoy reading. Not sure how you got the F word through though. LOL I'll keep following your comments.
Boring, tiresome, hyocritical. Well done.
One person buying one of these has zero bearing on another in London being a negligent parent.
I know you and your cohort like the think it's the rich (definition: anybody with more than you) are responsible for *everything* bad, but they are not. In the UK most child neglect and poverty is directly and only the responsibility of negligent parents - either through producing child after child they can't provide for, or not putting in the effort for those they have (so much insta, so little time).
One purchase of a car like this supports the jobs of hundreds, probably thousands of parents that allow them to feed, clothe and house their children.
Maybe look at your own contribution (or far more likely lack of) and choices before you decide you're in a position to judge others.
It looks a little generic and more of an incremental update of the Chiron. With such a limited production run, I am sure that it will sell out and that we will never see the car on any public roads. The Veyron was very much a Concorde moment for cars but Bugatti has seemed to struggle ever since to produce another model that moves the game on from the Veyron. In other recent announcements, Rimac has seemed to acknowledge that high-end hypercar EVs have limited appeal and a very limited market, which seems to raise a question about whether VW and Porsche will get the return they were expecting from Rimac taking over Bugatti. This has to be an issue because all the legacy car makers seem to be reassessing their EV plans.