Fondmetal SpA

Gabriele Rumi took over the running of his family's iron foundry business in 1961, at the age of 22 and the business enabled him to enjoy his passion for motor racing. When he retired from the sport in 1970 Rumi began to pay more attention to the business and decided to diversify into the light alloy business, producing parts for automotive engines and, in 1972, beginning to make lightweight alloy wheels. This business was called Fondmetal and proved to be a big success and in 1983 Rumi began sponsoring in F1, supporting Piercarlo Ghinzani with the Osella team. The following year Rumi expanded his F1 involvement, supplying wheels to Williams, Tyrrell and Ligier. In 1990 Rumi bought Osella, renamed it Fondmetal and ran his own F1 team until the middle of 1992 when, unable to find sponsorship, he shut it down.To keep an involvement in F1 he bought the bankrupt Govoni windtunnel at Casumaro in Italy and went into partnership with aerodynamicist Jean-Claude Migeot with the aim of diversifying into the field of automotive consultancy work with a company called Fondmetal Technologies.In 1996 Rumi was part of a group of Italian businessmen who bought the Minardi team and at the end of 1997 he became the majority shareholder in the team.Rumi, who died in May 2001, had already handed over the running of the family business to his son.