05.07.2004 Today in Essen, Germany, Sergio Pininfarina has received on behalf of the whole design team at the Italian design house, the “Red Dot: Design Team of the Year” award

Pininfarina is the best Design Team of 2004. Today, on the occasion of a ceremony gala in the Aalto Theatre of Essen, Germany, the Company’s Chairman Sergio Pininfarina has received on behalf of the whole design team the “Red Dot: Design Team of the Year” Award presented by the Design Zentrum Nordrhein Westfalen.

With this award, “the Red Dot jury honours Pininfarina’s merits as a forerunner of automobile design as well as the design Company’s innovative power and its entrepreneurial spirit”.

“This continuous success story lasting for many decades is unprecedented in the design world,” states Professor Peter Zec, the competition’s initiator, thus explaining the Company’s selection as design team of the year.

“The exceptional quality of Pininfarina predominantly results from the fact that its Presidents have, at an early stage, understood and managed design as a professional business.

"Due to the combination of construction and aesthetics, Pininfarina consistently manages to set industry standards and simultaneously integrate economic plausibility into its work.”

The “Radius” touring cup, symbol of the award, will be handed over by the previous year’s winner, the Nokia design team.

The Red Dot Design Award is one of the oldest and most sought-after design competitions world-wide. The 24 jurors from nine countries are internationally acknowledged design experts.

The product selection criteria includes degree of innovation, functionality, formal quality, symbolic and emotional content as well as ergonomics and ecological compatibility.

Since 1955, outstanding design quality has been annually selected and officially honoured in an exhibition by the Design Zentrum Nordrhein Westfalen.

This year the “Design innovations – red dot award: product design 2004” special exhibition will be presented from 6 July to 8 August.

Pininfarina will exhibit the “rossa” and the Metrocubo prototypes, the Ferrari Modulo and the Cisitalia scale models, the 3M video projector and the Lavazza coffee machine.