The company was founded by former racing driver, Scottish businessman, Tom Walkinshaw and is essentially a successor organisation to his previous automotive concern, Tom Walkinshaw Racing which was driven into bankruptcy by the failure of the Arrows Formula One team, then a part of TWR.
Walkinshaw was making his return to his involvement in Australian automotive industry initially through Holden Special Vehicles.
[2] In August 2016, Holden announced it would consolidate its sponsorship of the Supercars Championship at Triple Eight Race Engineering.
[3] With the closing of Holden in Australia, and the Walkinshaw Group subsequently becoming heavily involved with the conversion of LHD to RHD of large American trucks such as Silverado, as well as various re-engineering projects for other vehicle manufacturing companies, Walkinshaw Performance also turned their skills to the 4x4 market.
Working on models such as Silverado, RAM DS and VW Amarok, they have produced superchargers, headers, cat & lifts, as well as towing accessories.