The Porsche 959 is a sports car manufactured by Porsche from 1986 to 1989, first as a Group B rally car and later as a legal production car designed to satisfy FIA homologation regulations requiring that a minimum number of 200 street legal units be built. During its production run, it was hailed as being the most technologically advanced road-going sports car ever built and the harbinger of the future of sports cars: it was one of the first high-performance vehicles to use an all-wheel drive system; it provided the basis for Porsche's first all-wheel drive Carrera 4 model; and it convinced Porsche executives of the system's viability so well that they chose to make all-wheel drive standard on all versions of the 911 Turbo starting with the 993 variant. During its lifetime, the vehicle had only one other street legal peer with comparable performance, the Ferrari F40.[citation needed] The 959's short production run and performance have kept values high.[citation needed] In 2004, Sports Car International named this car number one on the list of Top Sports Cars of the 1980s.

Development of the 959 (originally called the Gruppe B) started in 1981, shortly after the company's then-new Managing Director, Peter Schutz, took his office. Porsche's head engineer at the time, Helmuth Bott, approached Schutz with some ideas about the Porsche 911, or more aptly, a new one. Bott knew that the company needed a sports car that they could continue to rely on for years to come and that could be developed as time went on.

Curious as to how much they could do with the rear-engined 911, Bott convinced Schutz that development tests should take place, and even proposed researching a new all wheel drive system. Schutz agreed, and gave the project green light. Bott also knew through experience that a racing program usually helped to accelerate the development of new models.

Seeing Group B rally racing as the perfect arena to test the new mule and its all wheel drive system, Bott again went to Schutz and got the go ahead to develop a car, based on his development mule, for competition in Group B.

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