"Ford then embarked on a brief but successful career as a racing driver. Victory in a race at Grosse Point brought him sufficient kudos for a second company, the Henry Ford Motor Company, founded just seven weeks later. Many invested who had already lost money financing the Detroit Automobile Company. The intention — of he backers at least — was to start making a car based on the one which had been responsible for Ford's famous racing victory. Yet only four months later, Ford was asked to leave and offered a severance payment of $900. The company was renamed the Cadillac Automobile Company and manufactured a car according to Ford's design, but with a single, rather than a two-cylinder motor. After 1909, as part of General Motors, Ford's arch rivals in later years, Cadillac became one of America's most prestigious makes of motor car — the exact opposite of the reputation Ford motor cars later acquired."