Ẽfini

In the late 1980s, Mazda diversified in the Japan market with the launch of three new marques. The company created Autozam, Eunos, and Ẽfini, in addition to the Mazda and Ford brands already marketed there. This experiment was ended in the mid-1990s.

The Ẽfini name and logo originated in several limited-edition RX-7s from the late 1980s. As a brand, it encompassed most, if not all dealers formerly under Mazda's "Auto" dealer chain.

The Ẽfini marque was a sport-oriented brand, as opposed to the more comfortable, luxury-oriented Eunos. Today, Mazda continues to use the Ẽfini name as one of the company's dealership chains, along with Autozam, but the vehicles sold no longer use it. This included the following vehicles:
* 1990-1997 Efini MPV/Mazda MPV
* 1991-1993 Efini MS-6/Mazda Cronos
* 1992-1997 Efini MS-8 car unique to the brand
* 1991-1993 Efini MS-9/Mazda 929
* 1991-1996 Efini RX-7/Mazda RX-7

Naming the marque

The name is written with a tilde over the E, which can be assumed to be a nasal vowel written in the International Phonetic Alphabet, the pronunciation symbols universally taught in Japan, and used quite often in product naming. The accompanying katakana (アンフィニ "anfini") shows the intended pronunciation in Japanese. A Google search for combinations of 'Mazda' with various spellings shows the following list, in descending order of popularity:
* (8230 hits) 'Anfini': the normal (Hepburn) romanisation of the Japanese reading
* (6170 hits) 'Efini': the IPA with the diacritic removed (most of these hits seem to be in Russian)
* (1470 hits) 'Enfini': presumably a misspelling (or misguess) of the French, influenced by the 'E-tilde' of the IPA.
* (956 hits) 'Infini': a point of confusion due to the similar pronunciation. The Infini was a special line of high-performance, lightweight 323s and 3rd-gen RX-7s. Taken from the word "infinity", which the logo (a sideways or "lazy" 8) symbolizes.
* (433 hits) 'Ifini': seen in New Zealand imports from Japan.Mazda spells the name "Anfini" in official corporate publications, but other official sites use "Enfini" and "Efini", see for example [http://www.enfini-aomori.co.jp/index.html Enfini-Aomori] .

External links

* [http://web.archive.org/web/20041011185012/http://www.scuderiaciriani.com/rx7/history.html Mazda RX-7 History (via Internet Archive)]