Who designed the Porsche 911? Butzi Porsche, Erwin Komenda and the lawsuit

This address used to be titled “The Porsche 911 Conspiracy”. It argued that Erwin Komenda was the true designer of the 911 and that Porsche erased him from its history. The question is fair; the conspiracy is not needed to ask it. German courts have been weighing a version of it since 2017.

Who does Porsche credit with designing the 911?

Porsche credits Ferdinand Alexander Porsche, known as Butzi, with designing the 911. He was Ferry Porsche’s eldest son, joined the company in the late 1950s, and became head of the design department in 1962 at 27. His 1959 Type 754 T7 body study already had the 911’s roofline, bonnet and headlight angle, and he refined it into the 901 shown at Frankfurt in 1963.

Google’s own answer to “who designed the Porsche 911” names only Butzi. That is the factory position, and it is well documented. It is not the whole record.

What did Erwin Komenda do at Porsche?

Erwin Komenda led Porsche’s body design department from November 1931 until his death in 1966. Before the 911 he shaped the body of the Volkswagen Beetle, the 1948 356/1 roadster and the production 356, and the 550 Spyder. He was the senior body engineer in the company when the 911 was developed and supervised its bodywork.

Why is the design disputed?

The design is disputed because two body projects ran in parallel and their authors clashed. Komenda’s department developed a proposal known as the T6, while Butzi Porsche developed the T7 line. Butzi complained that Komenda altered his drawings to suit production, and Ferry Porsche had the first 901 prototype body built by Reutter rather than in Komenda’s department. Car design was, and is, a team process: stylists set the shape, body engineers make it buildable, and the boundary between those roles is exactly where authorship arguments start.

The old page added claims we could not verify, such as Porsche deliberately cutting Komenda out of photographs and falsifying his age. We found no document supporting them, so they stay labelled as claims.

What happened in the Komenda lawsuit?

Komenda’s daughter sued Porsche AG, arguing her father was a co-author of the 911’s design and that his heirs were owed a share of its later success under German copyright law’s “fairness” provision for works that prove far more lucrative than expected.

Reports on the Federal Court’s decision say it did not overturn the lower courts’ view on the modern 911s; it faulted the handling of evidence from a witness, the plaintiff’s husband, who said Komenda had described the 911 as his design. Porsche’s 2022 stock market prospectus listed the dispute as ongoing, with the claim then framed as a small percentage of 911 revenues. We found no published final ruling as of September 2026.

So who designed the Porsche 911?

The documented answer is that Butzi Porsche created the 911’s design and Erwin Komenda’s department engineered its body, with each man’s share still argued in court. Both claims can be true in part. Neither needs a conspiracy.

Where can you read more?

Butzi Porsche’s career is on the Ferdinand Alexander Porsche page, the car’s early development on the Porsche 901 page, and primary sources on the research sources page.