Porsche Boxster 986

Never mind SUVS; this is Porsche's saviour

- Steve Sutcliffe

HARD as it may be to imagine, without the Boxster, Porsche might not have survived to even see in the 21st century, let alone go on to dominate it as far as the world of sports cars is concerned.

Back in the early nineties the company was struggling, and failing, to make ends meet. Its ancient four-cylinder cars were expensive and under threat from a raft of brilliant new six-cylinder turbocharged cars from Japan. Global sales were down to less than 20,000 cars a year, and, if you can believe it, the 911 was rapidly going out of fashion, while being heinously expensive to make. By 1995 it was the only Porsche on sale. So for a year or two, things really did look very shaky indeed for Germany's favourite sports car maker.

And then Porsche had its Eureka moment. Rather than going upmarket to dig itself out of the mire financially, it decided to do the opposite and go downmarket instead. The idea was to make a cut-price, mid-engined version of the next 911 (the 996), a car already well beyond the drawing board by then the plan being that both cars would share as many parts with one another as possible. The idea had been hatched after consulting with Toyota.

The cars would cost less to build and earn Porsche more of the profits it so desperately needed - as long as the world bought into the idea of there being two Porsches at different price points that shared a bunch of parts.

Fortunately, the world did, and the enduring appeal of the Boxster - which was joined by its fixed-head Cayman brother 10 years later - is testament to just how right Porsche's decision was all those years ago. The common view is that the Cayenne 'saved' Porsche from extinction in 2002, but in truth the Boxster/996 project was the one that mattered most. Without it, the Cayenne wouldn't even have been thought of five years later.