Ferrari produced it's first car in 1947 a 125 Sport with a V12 1.5 liter engine, and since then became one off the greatest sports car manufacturers. Enzo Ferrari where known for his aversion against Ferrari customers as he felt that people are not buying the cars for their performance value but rather for the glamorous status of the car. For Enzo everything was about performance.

Fiat owns 56% of Ferrari and are still striving to follow Enzo Ferrari's charisma. Other shareholders of Ferrari are: MediaBanca 15%, Commerzbank 10%, Lehman Brothers 7% and Enzo Ferrari's adopted son, Piero Ferrari owns 10%. This information is as of 2004.

The Ferrari company where guided successfully for decades by Enzo's firm personality traits. In November 1961 the friction between Ferrari's prolonged manager (sales), Girolamo Gardini, and Enzo's wife's involvement in the factory reached a breaking point. Gardini and Enzo's wife had steady arguments for long periods of time. It was a very tragic day when Gardini demanded that if tension does not resolve he will be leaving the factory. Enzo Ferrari would never let anybody dispute his authority and he took care of the situation by booting Gardini as well as the following people: Head engineer, Carlo Chiti, Ferrari manager, Romolo Tavoni, Head of sports car development, Giotto Bizzarrini and a couple of other workers who supported them. The casualties for Ferrari where severe and for some it was the end of Ferrari.

Gardini and his alliances soon established a new organization, AST (Automobili Turismo e Sport), and acquired Ferrari's primary racing customer namely: Scuderia Serenissima. AST will compete directly with Ferrari on and off the race tracks.

At this time Ferrari face a really big challenge in the absence of Gardini, Chiti and the rest. A new Ferrari sports car was in the middle of designing in order to counter the attack from Jaguar's E-type. This new design was inspired by Chiti which speaks for itself. The new 250 GTO's chassis and styling was not completed yet and even if they could complete it one were wondering whether they could race it without Tavoni and his team.

In this mess came greenhorn engineer, Mauro Forghieri and experienced racing body-man, Sergio Scaglietti. They stood up the challenge and Mauro perfecting the handling of the GTO. Sergio re-designed the body of the all new 250 GTO. Phil Hill, the racing driver, took the GTO to Sebring and where first in his class. The 250 GTO continue on it's winning streak to become one of the most popular Ferrari's in sports-car-history. Ferrari dismissed the Jaguar E-type's vigorous attack successfully.

The 1960's even became more exciting for Ferrari and the skilled engineer, Mauro. The Dino racers marked the beginning of Mauro's control with the 250 P's.

From 1963 to 1967 Ferrari had to defend attacks from US arrivals such as the AC Cobra of Carroll Shelby equipped with strong V8 engines. Ford motor company also tried to take over Ferrari unsuccessfully where after they more successfully controlled the 24hrs le Mans with their legendary Ford GT40. In 1968 the Ford GT40 and Ferrari 330P where banned after a decision from FIA to forbid prototypes exceeding 3000cc. Ferrari responded to this by boycotting racing and refuse to participate.

In 1969 a new rival to the bigger classes make it's debut. The German manufacturer, Porsche, mastered the Le Mans and more than often beat the Ferrari's. Porsche dominated until 1971 where after Ferrari took back control, with their 312PB, until 1972 when they decided to leave sport car racing to concentrate exclusively on the Formula 1 championship.

In 1988, the founder, Enzo Ferrari died and as a result second hand Ferrari's increased in price drastically. 1996 the well-known Formula 1 driver, Michael Schumacher came onboard for Ferrari where after they achieved unmatched success until 2004.