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Since the first cars arrived more than 130 years ago, thousands of cars and car companies have sprung up only to disappear without trace.
In some cases these cars have been revived, even though they should have been consigned to the history books forever. One example is Hummer (pictured), which has been revived as a new electric SUV brand by GMC.
We look at some of the motoring makes and models that have been brought back from the dead – sometimes more than once – and in many cases only to disappear once again:
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Abarth
Former motorcycle racer Carlo Abarth (1908-1979) built up a very successful business tuning Fiats and Simcas – so successful that Fiat bought his company in 1971 and turned it into nothing more than a badge to denote high-performance derivatives of its cars such as the Strada and Stilo.
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Abarth returns
But in 2008 the brand was resurrected as a company in its own right, offering the 500 (pictured), and a 124 Spider too (in 2016), though sales were slow of this last car and they stopped altogether in 2020. Sales of the Abarth continue, and in 2024 it unveiled the Abarth 500E, a new fast electric car.
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Allard
Sydney Allard set up his own company in 1945 and produced around 2000 luxury and sporting cars by the end of the following decade. Later, Allard would offer tuning kits for the Ford Anglia and Classic Capri, but by the late 1960s it was all over. Revisiting a model name used previously, a resurrected Allard showed its J2X Group C racer in 1992, just as the series was abandoned.
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Allard returns
In 1993, Allard returned with a reskinned Lexus LS400 called the P4. Despite a £29,400 premium over the standard car's £42,000 price tag, three cars were made of which just one is thought to survive today.
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Audi
August Horch (1868-1951) set up a car company in 1899, then a decade later he fell out with his colleagues. Unable to use his own name again, he set up a rival business called Audi. Its first car was the Type A of 1910, pictured. The company went onto merge with DKW and Wanderer in 1932 to form Auto Union.
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Audi returns
With DKW proving the dominant partner, the Audi brand died in 1939 only to be resurrected in 1965 when the company was bought by Volkswagen. It’s one of the few brands featured here that’s done rather well for itself; today it’s by far the largest producer of profit within the VW group, and Audi sold 1.9 million cars in 2023.
PICTURE: Audi Q3 Mk2
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Borgward
Here's one that nobody saw coming. In the late 1920s Carl Borgward (1890-1963) added an ailing Hansa-Lloyd car-making business to his own, which was making three-wheelers for the commercial market. It all ticked over nicely until things went belly up in 1961, and we all thought that was the last we'd heard of Borgward.
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Borgward returns
But then Borgward's grandson Christian Borgward set up a new venture backed by Chinese automotive group Beiqi Foton Motor. We got our first glimpse of a new Borgward production car at the 2015 Geneva motor show and the company put various SUVs into production. However, the company hit financial problems and closed down in 2021.
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Bugatti
Why settle for one comeback when you can have two? Ettore Bugatti (1881-1947) created a company to build luxury and sporting cars between the wars. He died in 1947, by which point the marque was already dead, but in the mid-1950s Ettore’s son Roland tried to jump-start the company.
He failed and so did former Chrysler design supremo Virgil Exner (1909-1973) who tried to relaunch Bugatti at the 1965 Turin motor show. Another revival in the 1990s led to the magnificent EB110 (pictured) – then failure once again.
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Bugatti returns
Next, empire building Volkswagen CEO Ferdinand Piëch (1937-2019) bought Bugatti in 1998; it relaunched with the Veyron in 2003 and at last it looked like the brand was back for good. It followed the Veyron with the Chiron of 2017; that car in August 2019 became the world’s fastest production car (pictured), achieving a top speed of 304.77mph (491 km/h). Bugatti merged with electric supercar specialist Rimac in 2021.
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Connaught
The original Connaught built grand prix cars and a handful of sports cars, the latter based on various Lea Francis models. Few cars were made in all, the company having started in 1952 with production pretty much over by the start of the 1960s.
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Connaught returns
Perhaps one of the most fascinating what-might-have-beens, the Connaught D-Type that surfaced in 2005 was a GT that featured an intriguing-sounding front-mounted 300bhp 2.0-litre V10. Priced at £65,000 and capable of 171mph, the car sank without trace soon after.
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Datsun
Datsun was born in 1931. Back then the company built a handful of cars in its first year, ramping up production to three figures in 1932. By the mid-1960s Datsun had started to sell cars in Europe, having already set up shop in the US. With Nissan branding taking over from the early 1980s, the brand was killed off altogether in 1986 and it seemed that was that.
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Datsun returns
But in 2013 Nissan relaunched Datsun as a budget brand for India, Russia, Indonesia and South Africa, with vehicles like this Go+ MPV. An idea championed by former Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn, after his fall interest in Datsun within Nissan declined, and the name died again in 2022.
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De Tomaso
Alejandro de Tomaso (1928-2003) set up shop in 1959 to build sports and racing cars in the same vein as Ferrari and Maserati. However, he didn't produce his own engines (they generally came from Ford) and his cars were always overshadowed by more glamorous rivals.
His biggest hit was the Pantera (pictured), produced in collaboration with Ford, which owned a controlling stake in his company for a while. De Tomaso closed down in 2004, the man himself having died in 2003.
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De Tomaso returns
Seven years later a De Tomaso SUV concept (pictured) was shown at the Geneva motor show. Borrowing a previous company model name - Deauville - the plan was to build 3000 of them. Then it all went quiet...
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ERA
ERA (English Racing Automobiles) made a small number of racing cars in the 1930s, so it was an unlikely candidate for resurrection.
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ERA returns
That didn’t stop a reborn ERA from arriving on the scene in 1989 with a turbocharged Mini.
However, while it was a reborn ERA, this time the initials stood for Engineering Research & Application. The boosted Mini was very well received, with 436 built between 1989 and 1991.
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Fisker
Danish-born car designer Henrik Fisker co-founded the company that wore his name in 2007. Two years later, the firm received a $528 million loan from the US government's Department of Energy to develop a shapely plug-in hybrid saloon named Karma (pictured). Deliveries began in 2011 after several costly delays but problems plagued the young company. After battery-related recalls, production stoppages, a frozen credit line, devastation from Hurricane Sandy, its founder's resignation and massive layoffs, Fisker collapsed and filed for bankruptcy in 2013.
Chinese supplier Wanxiang Group purchased the company's assets in 2014 and relaunched it as Karma Automotive. The Revero released for the 2017 model year is an updated variant of the original Karma and remains in low-volume production in 2020.
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Fisker returns
Henrik Fisker created another carmaker again called Fisker and pledged to revolutionise the electric car segment. It launched an SUV named Ocean (pictured) in 2021. However, the company hit financial problems once more and went bankrupt in 2024.
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Frazer-Nash
If ever there was an unlikely revival it’s this one. Britain’s Frazer-Nash built its first car in 1922 and focused on building sporting cars for the connoisseur for the next 35 years, with various changes of ownership along the way.
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Frazer-Nash returns
In the early 21st century Frazer-Nash sprang back to life as a consultancy to develop clean vehicles and transport networks, part of the larger Kamkorp Group that also owns Bristol Cars among other things. It was the exclusive supplier of electric vehicles to the Sydney Olympic Games of 2000.
While much of what it does goes on in the background, in 2009 we saw the first all-new Frazer-Nash in more than 50 years – a hybrid supercar concept called Namir, designed and built by Giugiaro (pictured).
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Hispano-Suiza
The first Hispano-Suizas were built in 1904. This Spanish company produced luxury cars like this H6C Targa model from 1924 until 1938, when it shifted to aircraft and munitions before evolving into SIAT – which in turn would become SEAT, today part of Volkswagen. In theory Hispano-Suiza never went away as it's still part of the SAFRAN aerospace group.
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Hispano-Suiza returns
However, the Hispano-Suiza name was brought back from the dead in 2002 with the HS21 GTS supercar concept that broke cover at the Geneva motor show. That disappeared without trace, only for Hispano-Suiza to reappear once more, at the 2010 Geneva motor show. This time it was with an Audi R8-based supercar, but it never went into series production. It returned to Geneva again in 2019, with the 1000bhp Carmen all-electric hypercar (pictured).
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Invicta
Launched in 1925 to build cars in the same vein as contemporary Bentleys, the Invicta brand died in 1938 only to start up again in 1946 with the ill-fated Black Prince (pictured). Just 16 or so of these innovative cars were made before the British company was wound up in 1950.
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Invicta returns
The company reappeared in 2004, now owned by Michael Bristow. He unveiled the quad-cam Ford V8-powered S1 with up to 600bhp, but by 2012 it was all over once more.
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Iso
Few car brands are as obscure as Iso, yet the marque has just been revived for the second time. It was Iso that developed the Isetta microcar which then sustained BMW throughout the 1950s and into the 1960s. After microcars, this Italian refrigerator manufacturer tried its hand at GTs such as the Fidia, Lele, Rivolta and – most notably – the Grifo (pictured).
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Iso returns
By 1974 Iso had bitten the dust only to return in 1990 with a non-running prototype that would later be turned into a one-off fully driveable car. Now Iso is back once more with the Rivolta Vision (pictured), created for Sony’s Gran Turismo Sport with Zagato set to build up to five copies of the Corvette-based hypercar.
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Jensen
As well as building bodies for other brands (such as Austin and Volvo), Jensen built its own range of sporting and luxury cars from 1934. It was best known for the Interceptor (pictured) and its four-wheel drive derivative the FF, the world's first car with anti-lock brakes. Jensen had gone out of business by 1976.
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Jensen returns
At the 1998 British motor show Jensen made a comeback but it would be another three years before its S-V8 (pictured) would go into production. After just 20 cars were completed the company went bust, although another dozen examples were completed in 2003 by yet another iteration of the company: Jensen International Automotive.
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Lagonda
Founded by Wilbur Gunn (1859-1920) and named after his hometown in Ohio, Lagonda built sporting cars for the wealthy enthusiast, like this LG6 from 1938. Swallowed up by Aston Martin in 1947, the final model from the marque was the Rapide, production of which finished in 1965.
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Lagonda returns 1
Lagonda was used as a model name for the crazy Wiliam Towns-designed saloon that appeared in 1976, then it all went quiet until the 2009 Geneva motor show when a visually aggressive SUV was unveiled, based on a Mercedes GL-Class (pictured). It all went quiet again until the very expensive Taraf saloon broke cover in 2015; just 120 or so were built.
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Lagonda returns 2
Aston Martin unveiled a new Lagonda concept car at the 2018 Geneva motor show - the latest relaunch of a marque that was first seen in 1906. Aston Martin promised that the new car would offer a ‘private jet for the road’ owner experience when it arrived in production, but that never happened as new management arrived and cancelled the project.
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Lea Francis
A company that's had more than its fair share of rebirths, Lea Francis built its first car in 1903 and survived right the way through to 1962, turning turtle after unveiling the radical Lynx sports car. Three prototypes were made before the company closed.
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Lea Francis returns
It was then relaunched in 1980 with the strange looking 3 Litre Sports, renamed the Ace of Spades in 1992 (pictured). The marque was revived once more in 1998 with the ungainly 38/250, which also quickly disappeared into the ether.
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Lister
In the early days it was a racing car builder, set up by Brian Lister (1926-2014) who built 50 cars up to 1959. The brand was then largely mothballed but it was acquired in 1986 by Lawrence Pearce who tuned Jaguar XJSs before creating the formidable V12-powered Storm, which proved unassailable in GT racing.
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Lister returns
The company changed hands once again in 2013, to focus on continuation 50s-style racers and – once again – tuned Jaguars. In 2018 Lister unveiled its 666bhp Jaguar F-Type R-based LFT-666, 64 years after the marque made its debut. In 2019 it launched the LFP (pictured), a V8 SUV based on the Jaguar F-Pace, capable of 0-62mph in 3.5sec and a top speed of 200mph.
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Marcos
It's extremely rare for an original brand custodian to revive their own company but that's what happened with Marcos. First set up by Jem MARsh and Frank COStin (hence the Marcos name) in 1959, the company thrived for a while but closed down in 1972, after it had been sold on.
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Marcos returns
Marsh bought back the rights to the name in 1976 but it would be another five years before Marcos returned, only to go bust again in 2000. In 2002 Tony Stelliga relaunched Marcos and introduced a series of new models, but by 2007 it was all over once more.
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Maybach
First set up by Wilhelm Maybach (1846-1929) in 1909 to build engines for airships, the company also manufactured luxury cars from 1921 until 1940 like the magnificent Zeppelin (pictured). Maybach built tank engines throughout the war - including a 690bhp V12 for the infamous Tiger I - then it all went quiet until Daimler-Benz bought the company in 1960.
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Maybach returns 1
But it would be another 37 years before the brand reappeared with a luxurious saloon unveiled at the 1997 Tokyo motor show. A production car followed in 2002 (pictured) but sales proved sluggish and in 2013 the brand was effectively mothballed.
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Maybach returns 2
It's since been revived again as a range-topping trim level on Mercedes-Benz luxury cars, firstly on the S-Class and S-Class Cabriolet, and then in late 2019 a GLS-based Maybach SUV was unveiled at the Guangzhou Motor Show (pictured). The SL sports car has also been given the Maybach treatment too, launched in 2024.
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Packard
Between 1899 and 1959 Packard built some of the most luxurious and advanced cars in America, but despite a merger with Studebaker in 1954 it found it impossible to compete with The Big Three and the last Packard was produced in 1962; the company as whole exited the car business in 1966.
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Packard returns
Then, in 1993 entrepreneur Roy Gullickson decided to bring the Packard marque back from the dead. Five years later the Packard Twelve was first shown. A 573bhp 8.6-litre V12 powered the four-door four-wheel drive saloon but it seems nobody wanted to buy one. The sole prototype built (pictured) was sold by RM Auctions in 2014, for $143,000.
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Pegaso
Pegaso was a Spanish truck maker launched in 1946, but in the 1950s it dabbled in building outlandishly styled sports cars. The Z-102 (pictured) was its only mainstream production model with a whopping 100 or so built; just three examples of its successor, the Z-103, were constructed before the company realised it needed to focus on making trucks rather than cars.
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Pegaso returns
Pegaso survived until the 1980s but was then brought back from the dead in 1990 with a car heavily inspired by the original (pictured). A recession then hit so it’s doubtful that any of these new cars were ever actually made, although two prototypes are rumoured to have been built.
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Spyker
Originally a coachbuilder in the true sense (of carriages), Dutch company Spyker started trading in 1880. By 1903 it had built the world's first four-wheel drive car with brakes on all four wheels and a six-cylinder engine. After around 2000 cars had been made Spyker closed down in 1926.
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Spyker returns
In 1999 the name was adopted for a new company which produced the C8 supercar with an Audi 4.2-litre V8. Since then the company has built around 300 cars, but it's all gone a bit quiet lately...
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Trident
Britain’s Trident was always a low-profile company, with just 130 or so cars made between 1966 and 1978. Fitted with either six- or eight-cylinder engines, the Clipper, Venturer and Tycoon (pictured) were intriguing sports cars that are still largely unknown.
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Trident returns
So bringing the Trident marque back from the dead was an odd decision, but that's what happened when a new car appeared in 1998, only to disappear then reappear in 2000 as the Iceni (pictured). The company occasionally threatens to resurface, and its website is still live but we're not holding our breath.
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TVR
Britain’s TVR built its first car in 1949 and over the next 57 years it changed hands several times and created some incredible sports cars, but it couldn't last. The final cars were built in 2006 and it looked like that was it.
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TVR returns
But in 2013 the brand was sold to Les Edgar and John Chasey. They unveiled the new TVR Griffith at the 2017 Goodwood Revival event, but production has been held up by delays in establishing the company’s new factory in Wales. The only prototype has been registered for use on UK roads, but the TVR story has gone very quiet recently.
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Veritas
Originally named BMW-Veritas as it focused on tuning BMW 328s, this German maker of sports and racing cars was soon renamed Veritas after BMW kicked up a fuss about its name being used. Just a handful of cars such as this were made before the company shut up shop in 1952.
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Veritas returns
The marque was brought back from the dead in 2001 with a BMW V12-engined sports car concept, which was very enthusiastically received. As a result the RS III (pictured) went into production in 2009 – now with a BMW V10 – with production limited to 30 cars, priced at £245,000 a go.
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