Ettore Arco Isidoro Bugatti (15 September 1881 – 21 August 1947) was an Italian-born French[1] automobile designer and manufacturer.

He was the elder son of Carlo Bugatti (1856–1940), an important Italian Art Nouveau furniture and jewellery designer, and his wife, Teresa Lorioli (1862–1935).

[4] With financial support from a Count Gulinelli,[5] Bugatti developed a second prototype, the Type 2, which was a prize-winning exhibit at the Milan Trade Fair in the Spring of 1901.

[4] Frontier changes following the Franco-Prussian War had left De Dietrich with two car factories in two different countries: the Niederbronn plant, to which Bugatti now relocated was in Alsace, which had been part of Germany since 1871, reverting to French control only in 1919.

[4] The two became first friends and then business partners, leaving De Dietrich in 1904 in order to produce automobiles of their own, which were identified with the name "Mathis-Hermes (Licence Bugatti)".

[4] This arrangement lasted till 1906 after which the partners went their separate ways, and Bugatti set up a "Research centre" at Illkirch-Graffenstaden, now a suburb on the south-side of Strasbourg.

While displaced from his home in Alsace by World War I, Bugatti designed aeroplane engines, notably the somewhat baroque 16-cylinder U-16, which was never built in any large number and was installed in only a very few aircraft.

It was designed by Louis de Monge using two type 50B Bugatti engines but never flew due to the outbreak of World War II.

[4] He was almost certainly unaware of the court decision whereby his property in Alsace, which had been seized by the state in the feverish post-liberation frenzy of anger and retribution which his Italian origins had invited, was restored to him on 20 June 1947; Bugatti died just over two months later, on 21 August without having recovered consciousness.