Croatian supercar builder Rimac Automobili has appointed Chris Porritt to the role of Chief Technology Officer. Mr. Porritt has spent over three decades in the automotive industry—previous positions include Chief Engineer at Aston Martin, VP of Engineering at Tesla, and lead at Apple’s Special Projects Group. He has overseen the development of several bespoke performance and electric vehicles, including Aston Martin’s One-77 hypercar and V12 Vantage Zagato.

Rimac is currently deep into the development of its next electric hypercar, codenamed C_Two. Prototypes are being built, tested, and crashed for global homologation. Rimac says the production version of the C_Two will deliver a 0-100 km/h time of under 2 seconds and a top speed of 258 mph. The company plans to hand-build 150 units of the vehicle on a new production line in Croatia, beginning in 2021. Rimac has developed and built all the major systems and components for the C_Two in-house.

Rimac’s partners include Koenigsegg, Automobili Pininfarina, Aston Martin, Porsche and Hyundai.

“I had concerns that people with great industry experience would not be a fit for our culture and company spirit,” said Rimac Automobili founder and CEO Mate Rimac. “However, as a car enthusiast through and through, who gets [his] hands dirty himself, Chris fit right in from the first moment. We share the same mindset: we want to develop cars that raise the bar, are fun and great quality. I can’t wait to see what we will be able to create together.”

“The opportunity to join Rimac Automobili is an engineer’s dream,” said Chris Porritt. “Since nearly every key component is designed and built in-house by Rimac, this gives us the freedom to create something that’s unlike anything else that has been done before in the hypercar world. Rimac is the perfect place to use my combined experience in the engineering of supercars at Aston Martin and the EV engineering experience I gained in California.”

Source: Rimac