Home Mazda Persona

Mazda Motor Corporation is a Japanese car manufacturer founded by Jujiro Matsuda. In 1921 he took over Toyo Cork Kogyo, ceased the production of cork and started producing machine tools. In 1931 it switched to manufacturing vehicles with the first model being Mazda-Go. This marked the beginning of Mazda Motor Corporation. In the early 1960s Mazda started a major development of the Wankel rotary engine as it wanted to differentiate itself from its competitors. These engines provided good power and light weight in comparison to the V6 and V8 piston-driven engines of its competitors, who produced the same power but were much heavier. From that moment on Mazda rapidly started exporting vehicles both with rotary and piston-driven engines. The RX series and the R100 were the company's top sellers. Nowadays it has become the sole manufacturer of Wankel-type engines. The 1973 oil-crises slowed down the company as customers were seeking for cars with better fuel efficiency. At that moment Mazda put its efforts in its small Familia series with piston-driven engines and preserved the rotary engines for sports cars such as the RX-7 and RX-8. As a results of its efforts in 1989 it came up with the lightweight sports car Mazda Roadster, better known as MX-5. It literally revived the market of small sports cars and had a huge success. Following on its decades-long interests in alternative engine technology, Mazda introduced a Miller-cycle engine on the Millenia luxury sedan in 1995 and in the Demio model from 2008. Again the company is the only one to use a Miller-cycle engine in the production of cars. An important moment in the history of Mazda is its collaboration with Ford, which started in 1979. The partnership has lead to many joint projects and by 1997 Ford held 33.9% of Mazda. It was in this year that the current Mazda logo was introduced. Though all the company's cars were branded as Mazda, this name was officially established as a corporate identity sign in 1975. The company has always aimed to produce and market cars that provide high safety and environmental performance and at the same time are fun to drive. At present Mazda is the 15th largest producer of cars and LCVs in the world (OICA, 2009) and its current portfolio includes Mazda 2/Demio and Verisa (hatchbacks), Mazda 3/Axela (hatchbacks, sedans), Mazda 5/Premacy and Mazda 8/MPV (MPVs), Mazda 6/Atenza (sedans, station wagons, liftbacks), MX-5 (roadsters, hardtops), RX-8 (sports coupe), Tribute, CX-7 and CX-9 (SUVs), BT-90 (pick-up trucks). The catalog below lists a variety of models by Mazda, for which are provided technical specifications and data.