It’s hard to believe but Gordon Murray only founded GMA back in 2017 at the age of 71.  Clearly Gordon’s idea of a nice, relaxed, stress free retirement is a bit different from the norm.  I do remember hearing about the T.50 for the first time back in June 2019 and received a brochure pack on it that August.  The official launch happened a year later and, despite it being in the middle of COVID, created a huge amount of buzz and excitement.

 Production officially started in 2023 and deliveries began earlier this year.  That makes it basically three years from the model’s first unveiling to the start of production.  It is hugely impressive especially when you consider the impact that COVID had on the whole development timing.  While I am sure there have been internal growing pains, from an outsider’s perspective, GMA has done just about everything right.  They have provided public progress updates frequently, opened their factory doors to leading journalists, run the cars at major events without any issues and, from what I understand, kept their depositors closely in the loop in terms of development. 

In addition, having Dario Franchitti first as a brand ambassador and test driver and now officially as the Director of Product and Brand has worked brilliantly.   He’s not only engaging and charismatic, but also brings another level of credibility to the endeavor. 

All 100 units of the T.50 models were spoken for back in 2020, just two days after launch, and GMA’s second model, the T.33, sold out near instantly as well.  The planned 100 units of the 3rd model, the T.33 Spider, I understand are now all spoken for.  On top of launching three road cars and the T.50s track-only variant, GMA has also built a new £50 million Headquarters and Production facility in Highams Park, Surrey, UK.  The T.50 production has been moved to the new site from the original Dunsfold Park production facility that I had the pleasure of visiting last year.  While the T.50 will be imported into the US under “Show & Display” rules, both the T.33 models will be fully US homologated.

Back in 2022, the Gordon Murray Group announced that they were beginning development of two EV SUVs.  With the divesture of the Gordon Murray Technologies division (GMG Technologies Divestment), which was developing those projects, they have now been passed into new hands.  In the divestment announcement, one of the key reasons for the divestment was to “pave the way for enhanced focus on its core automotive business of bespoke build, low-volume luxury supercars”.  The strategy and path forward is now quite clear.  GMA will be solely focused on producing supercars in very limited production runs. 

 As a private company with no publicly traded debt, GMA is only required to file its accounts once a year with Companies House in the UK.  The last filing I could find was from the fiscal year ended in March 2022 and it indicated that GMA had around £40 million cash and cash equivalents on hand.  The filing also indicated that the order book was filled for the next 2-3 years.

Recently, out in Monterey I did get a chance to catch up with a few of the GMA Team and spend some time with GMA CEO Phillip Lee.  My net takeaway from the discussion with Lee is that the business is doing quite well.  Lee seemed very happy with the order book and is quite confident about the future.  Funding doesn’t seem to be an issue as GMA has invested heavily in its new Headquarters and Production facility.  GMA had recently received US “Show & Display” approval for the T.50 which clearly took a lot of stress off the organization, and they reiterated that all the T.33 models would be fully US homologated.  It’s clear GMA views the US as a critical market going forward as clearly demonstrated by the amount they invested during Monterey Car Week and specifically at the Quail.

When I asked the inevitable question in regard to the now 78-year-old founder, I didn’t get the usual canned, “he’s doing well and remains highly engaged”.  Instead, the reply was that Gordon has already designed enough new models to keep us busy well into the 2040s.  Net net, there are already enough new car ideas and plans to keep GMA going for decades whether or not Gordon remains actively involved.  The other piece of information I found quite enlightening is the commitment to the Cosworth supplied GMA V12 engine.  It seems we will continue to see this engine in future models.  Speaking of future models, the rumor on GMA’s stand at The Quail was that we will likely be seeing another new GMA supercar in 2025.  My guess is it will be a third T.33 variant with production set at 100 units as per all the other GMA models.

In a very short time GMA has created several spectacular cars and established itself as one of the leading supercar luxury brands.  The T.50 is the only car I know that reached “icon status” before the 1st car was even delivered.  What started in a warehouse at Dunsfold has migrated in a few short years to a new £50 million Headquarters and Production facility.  Gordon’s built an impressive team from scratch and the order book is full.  GMA seems to have a very good idea of who they want to be and who they are not.  They have carved out what I would guess is a quite profitable niche in the supercar market and appear to be staying quite true to that very limited-edition high value approach.