Mate Rimac Just Hinted Bugatti Could Build A Manual, Non-Hybrid V-16 Tourbillon
Mate Rimac is floating an idea that runs completely against the grain of everything he’s built his career on. In an interview with Top Gear published October 26, the Bugatti CEO suggested a future Tourbillon variant could ditch the hybrid system entirely, pairing a naturally aspirated V-16 with a genuine manual transmission and a significant weight cut.
That’s a bigger claim than it sounds. The current Tourbillon already represents Bugatti’s answer to the Chiron, built around an 8.3-liter Cosworth V-16 that makes 986 horsepower and 664 lb-ft on its own, then gets boosted to 1,775 hp total with three electric motors and a 25-kWh battery. Rimac is now talking about stripping all of that hybrid hardware out, along with the eight-speed dual-clutch gearbox, and bolting a clutch pedal and a real shifter straight to the engine.
Rimac Calls The Tourbillon A Platform, Not A Final Answer
Rimac told Top Gear that the Tourbillon “made a lot of sense as a successor to the Chiron,” but he’s already thinking past it. “I wonder myself, what’s next for Bugatti and what would be interesting to do?” he said, pointing toward “light weight and simplification of stuff.” Instead of what he called a sledgehammer approach that defined Bugatti for two decades, he wants something “more engaging, more back to the roots, more Type 35,” a reference to the brand’s dominant 1920s Grand Prix racer, built light and mechanical with none of the modern hypercar’s electronic safety net.
This isn’t the first time he’s raised the idea. Back in August, Rimac told Road & Track he was interested in a “real manual” for a Tourbillon-based model, distinct from the simulated gearbox Ferrari uses in the 12Cilindri Manuale. The new detail from Top Gear is the part that changes the math: removing the hybrid system isn’t just about weight, it’s about simplifying the entire drivetrain enough that a manual gearbox is actually feasible behind nearly 1,000 hp instead of 1,775.
Why Rimac’s Word Carries More Weight Than Usual Hypercar Speculation
Executives float hypothetical variants all the time, but Rimac’s track record makes this one harder to dismiss. He’s the reason the Tourbillon has a V-16 at all. When Volkswagen Group pushed him to build an electric Chiron successor using his own Nevera platform, Rimac refused, betting that wealthy buyers wanted mechanical drama over battery-powered acceleration figures. The Nevera’s soft sales, just 71 units moved against a planned run of 150, backed him up. All 250 Tourbillons sold out anyway.
Now that Porsche has exited Bugatti Rimac entirely, handing full control to the Rimac Group and HOF Capital, he answers to no parent company’s electrification roadmap. “Having the company independent from any car manufacturer, we can really think long-term and do bold things,” he told Top Gear. Asked directly about a manual gearbox, his response was blunt: “Absolutely. You bet.”
The Engineering Problem Nobody’s Solved Yet
None of this is confirmed, and Bugatti hasn’t announced a model, a timeline, or even a name. Building a manual gearbox that survives a 9,000-rpm V-16 producing 664 lb-ft is a real engineering fight, not a styling exercise. Bugatti’s own EB110 ran a conventional six-speed manual behind a quad-turbo V12 back in the 1990s, so the brand isn’t starting from zero.
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