FIAT SPA

formerly Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino, international holding company and major Italian manufacturer of automobiles, trucks, and industrial vehicles and components. It is the largest family-owned corporation in Italy. Headquarters are in Turin. Fiat was incorporated in 1906 as the successor to a company formed in 1899 by Giovanni Agnelli. Because of the high level of skilled workers in Turin and the local school of engineering, the company was able to gain an early lead on its competitors. The success of Fiat was in large part the work of two men. Founder Giovanni Agnelli, whose family still holds a major interest in the company, led the firm from its formative years until his death in 1945. An intellectual socialist, he saw the automotive industry as a means of providing transportation to the masses, as well as producing jobs for workers. This odd combination of socialism and industrialism proved to be a potent combination in the Italian automotive industry. By 1910 the firm was the largest in Italy, a position it has maintained since. The other major figure in the firm's development was Vittorio Valletta, an unusually skilled administrator, who as general manager guided the day-to-day activities of the company. By the early 1920s Fiat manufactured more than 80 percent of the automobiles sold in Italy, and the company maintained this near-monopoly of the domestic market in the decades after World War II. In 1979 the corporation converted to a holding company by spinning off a number of autonomous companies covering various separate operations. In 1986 Fiat acquired Alfa Romeo SpA (q.v.), an ailing Italian company that manufactured sports cars. Today Fiat is a massive, multinational firm with assembly plants and licenses in many European and overseas countries. Among its automotive names are Ferrari and Lancia. The company also has interests in retailing, chemicals, and civil engineering in addition to manufacturing farm equipment, earth-moving machinery, and a vast array of automotive components.