It was Porsche chief Wendelin Wiedeking's idea to buy into VW, Mr Baumann says, in order to "secure the independence of our company".

BBC: NEWS | Business | Unstoppable Porsche unveils fastest car yet

This year, the other medals went to Andrei Okhounkov of Princeton University, Terence Tao of the University of California, Los Angeles, and Wendelin Werner of the University of Paris.

ECONOMIST: Proof of the truth of the Poincar�� conjecture