Thomas Bscher

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Dr. Thomas Bscher (pronounced "Bay-share") (born 2 April 1952, Marburg) is an automobile race car driver, executive, and banker.

From 1986 to 1995, Bscher was partner with the Sal. Oppenheim bank in Cologne, responsible for corporate finance and financial markets. prior to that, he worked for a number of banks, particularly Deutsche Bank, Brown Brothers Harriman and S.G. Warburg.

As a racer of expensive and fast sports cars and supercars, Bscher won the 1995 BPR Global Endurance GT Series driving a McLaren F1 GTR. The pinnacle of his motorsports career came at the 1999 24 Hours of Le Mans, where his BMW V12 LM ranked fifth.

He came to the attention of BMW chief, Bernd Pischetsrieder, in 1999 while driving one of that company's cars at the 24 Hours of Le Mans race.

When taking over at Volkswagen AG, Pischetsrieder promoted Bscher to president of Bugatti. Bscher has extensive management and racing experience, a combination that made him ideally suited for Bugatti, as VW chairman Dr. Bernd Pischetsrieder noted when he appointed him to his current job.

He headed Bugatti Automobiles SAS, part of Volkswagen AG, from December 2003 till March 2007.

[edit] Organisation of Bugatti Automobiles

Eventually the company will have about 130 people working for them. The Veyron costs 1,000,000 euros ($1.3 million) plus tax, the total production is limited to 300 units, the first 40 cars are spoken for, and there are going to be no more than 20 dealers worldwide. The company has the land and the planning permission to expand the factory and assemble between 1,000 and 2,000 units per year should they choose to expand. Bugatti will be profitable from chassis number one. The explanation is that, VW has already written off all the upfront investment.