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Mazda and Mazda MX-5 car covers
 Mazda are a Japanese car manufacturer based in Hiroshima, they produce vehicles for a worldwide, global market and have risen to critical acclaim both with their smaller, economical vehicles and their rotary engined sports vehicles such as the RX-8. The name Mazda is taken from the pronunciation of the founders name, Jujiro Matsuda, after it has been anglicised. It is also a nod to Zoroastrianism, Mazda is a divine spirit praised by Zoroaster and a wise and intelligent character.
The Mazda company can trace its roots back to 1920 when it was founded as the Toyo Cork Kogyo Co Ltd. Initially the company created machine tools but quickly moved their attention to producing their own vehicles, by 1931 they had produced the Mazda-Go and it went on to sell very well and earned what would eventually be renamed Mazda a good initial reputation. Toyo Kogyo went on to produce weapons for the war effort during the Second World War, and even though every car ever produced by the company was always referred to as a Mazda the actual company re-branded themselves as Mazda in 1984.
The 1960's saw major development taking place on the Wankel rotary engine, Mazda utilised this unique design of engine as a way to seperate themselves from other manufacturers and as a unique selling point. To this day Mazda are the only people crating cars using Wankel rotary engines despite the best efforts of other companies such as GM and Citroen who failed in their efforts to produce a working, reliable prototype. It was the introduction of the rotary engine that raised the profile of Mazda enough for them to sell their vehicles abroad, the R100 and RX series of vehicles all went on to critical success in America and Europe and the rotary engine was loved for its light weight and small footprint yet high power output.
Unfortunately the 1973 oil crisis saw sales of rotary engine vehicles dry up; many people were shifting to cars that offered far higher fuel efficiency and the Wankel design was relatively thirsty. Mazda stepped in with a number of standard engined cars throughout the 1970's such as the Familia and Capella series. This allowed Mazda to refine the rotary engine further and keep it for their sports oriented vehicles such as the RX-7 and RX-8. Mazda are also largely responsible for re-inventing the small sports car thanks to the success of their MX-5 that was released in 1989 and continues to be a favourite with motorists across the globe.
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