Thursday 9th March 1939

Born on this day, Malcolm Bricklin, a US automotive entrepreneur best known for his self-named automobile company, and for being one of the few Americans who has successfully imported foreign cars with Subaru, Fiat and Yugo.

Bricklin founded Subaru of America in 1968, in order to import and sell Subaru vehicles in the United States. He sold his interest in Subaru of America during the early 1970s, and founded a new company to manufacture his own car, the Bricklin SV-1. Built in New Brunswick, Canada, the Bricklin SV-1 was sold from 1974 to 1976, with less than 3000 vehicles sold. Bricklin re-entered the auto industry in 1982, importing and selling Fiat’s X-19 and Spider convertibles under the brand name of Bertone. In 1986, he began importing the Yugo hatchback from Yugoslavia, selling more than 120,000 of the vehicles during the first three years of this venture. Selling his interest in the Yugo during the early 1990s, Bricklin has since made and marketed an electronic bicycle known as the EV Warrior. In 2004, Bricklin’s company, Visionary Vehicles, made a deal to import and distribute vehicles made by the Chinese company Chery Automobile Co., but the deal later collapsed. Bricklin filed a number of lawsuits over the deal, winning a $2 million judgment against a former partner in the deal in 2013