The DeLorean cost $175M to build a car company — it made 9,000 cars and went bust

John DeLorean, a former GM executive who had helped create the Pontiac GTO, founded the DeLorean Motor Company in 1975 with a vision: an 'ethical' sports car with stainless steel body panels and gull-wing doors. He raised approximately $175 million, including $55 million from the British government to build a factory in Dunmurry, Belfast, as part of a jobs program in Northern Ireland.

The DMC-12, designed with Lotus Cars' engineering help, launched in 1981 at $25,000 — nearly double the original target price. It was underpowered (130 hp from a Peugeot-Renault-Volvo V6), heavy, and slower than competitors costing half as much. The stainless steel panels, while distinctive, could not be painted and showed every dent. Only about 9,000 were produced.

DeLorean Motor Company filed for bankruptcy in January 1982. John DeLorean was arrested in October 1982 in an FBI drug sting — later acquitted due to entrapment — but the company was already dead. The Belfast factory closed, 2,500 jobs were lost, and the British government's $55 million investment returned nothing. The car became famous only after appearing in Back to the Future in 1985, three years after its maker went bust.