Gautam Sen

Internationally acknowledged as the leading automotive journalist and writer in India, having founded the country’s first newsstand car magazine Indian Auto in 1986, Gautam Sen also launched Auto India in 1993, which became India’s best-selling car magazine ever. Later he also launched the Indian editions of auto motor and sport and BBC’s TopGear magazine. Since 2007 Sen has been back in the driver’s seat at Auto India and has been dividing his time between Paris, where his family lives, and Mumbai.

Though less publicized, Sen has also been directly involved with the automobile industry in India and Europe, beginning with his first automotive job at Maruti Udyog Limited, India’s leading carmaker, and then subsequently consulting at various levels in the areas of technology, design, product development, marketing and joint ventures, and in the process, interacting with the likes of Hero Motors, Hindustan Motors, Ideal Jawa, Mahindra & Mahindra, San Motors, Tata Motors, and TVS-Suzuki. Sen also lead the design and development of India’s first sports car, the San Storm.

Whilst working on design and development projects, Sen has worked with eminent designers such as Gerard Godfroy, Tom Tjaarda and Marcello Gandini.

Sen has authored several critically acclaimed books on automobiles: The Maharajas & Their Magnificent Motor Cars (published in French by E.T.A.I., in English by Haynes Publishing and in German by Heel), The Car Design Book, Rolls-Royce 17EX A Fabulous Destiny, and A Million Cars for a Billion People, other than co-authoring The Story of the Star in India and The Royal Udaipur RR GLK 21.

Michael Robinson

Born in 1956 in Los Angeles, California, Micheal Robinson’s love affair with cars started when he was 16 years old after he stumbled across a 1970 Strato’s Zero poster. Inspired by this image, he immigrated to Italy in 1979 to seek out a career in car design. Robinson then spent 19 years at Fiat, designing the interiors for the Fiat Bravo/Brava and Marea. At age 40, he was promoted to Design Director at Lancia, where he pioneered the first autonomous cars in Europe: the 1998 Lancia Dialogos, with Artificial Intelligence called Ambrogio, and the 2000 Lancia Nea. He also designed Pope John Paul II’s personal limousine in 1999. In 2009, Mike became Design Director at Bertone, where he developed many concept cars like the Alfa Romeo Centennial Pandion, plus the Frecciarossa 1000 high-speed train (presently in service all across Italy), and the AgustaWestland Project Zero, a fully electric VTOL concept helicopter. Today Robinson is a partner in ED Design, the largest independent design and engineering service in Italy. In 2015, ED presented a radical, windowless, autonomous, electric racecar concept called Torq at the Geneva Auto Show. Robinson is a renowned futurist and keynote speaker. In 2003, Robinson was inducted into the Car Designer Hall of Fame at the Italian National Auto Museum (MAUTO).