It might surprise you to know that McLaren Automotive, as an entity, has only been around for 12 years. While the first car that was produced by McLaren was the F1 back in 1992–1993, that was released under a division of the company proper that was simply named McLaren Cars. In fact, between 1994 and 2010, McLaren Cars was registered with the government of the UK as a dormant company.
It was dormant still when the Mercedes-Mclaren SLR was made, as that was technically a Mercedes-Benz. However, working on the SLR made some of the higher-ups at the company begin to think that maybe there was a place in the market for a supercar, or even multiple models of supercars, from the company that made the F1. There was really only one way to find out.
