Carlo Abarth, born Karl Albert Abarth, was an automobile designer. He was born in Vienna, during the time of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He was European bike champion five times. After a serious accident in Linz he abandoned motorbike racing, and designed a sidecar with which he did beat the Orient Express railway on the 1,300-kilometre stretch from Vienna to Ostend in 1934.

He moved permanently to Italy, where he met Ferdinand Porsche´s son-in-law Anton Piëch. Abarth got to know Ferry Porsche, and became the Italian head of Porsche’s design studio. Together with engineer Rudolf Hruska and Piero Dusio he established the Compagnia Industriale Sportiva Italia (CIS Italia, later becoming Cisitalia). Abarth then founded the Abarth & C. company with Cisitalia racing driver Guido Scagliarini in Bologna, using his astrological sign, the Scorpio, as the company logo. The same year, Abarth & Co moved to Turin. The company made racing cars, and became a major supplier of high-performance exhaust pipes. He then moved back to his native Vienna, Austria, where he died in 1979.