Yes, Lotus Racing is now Team Lotus, at least according to FIA’s 2011 official entry list that was released at the end of last month. What does team boss Tony Fernandes have to say about yesterday’s announcement that Group Lotus has bought over Renault’s shares in the Renault F1 Team to form Lotus-Renault?
“Dany Bahar has done us a favour. Never felt better about our future and Team Lotus. Looks like they’re trying to hijack our black and gold idea,” Fernandes wrote on his Twitter page, referring to Group Lotus’ CEO. Last month, Lotus Racing said that they will be ditching their green/yellow for the famous black/gold livery.
Technical chief Mike Gascoyne also had something to say. “Thanks for all the messages of support from our fans,” he wrote on Twitter. “Rest assured, we are Team Lotus and we are here to stay and we at Team Lotus are in F1 to design, build and race F1 cars from our home in Norfolk, and in the future to win as a Team, bring it on.”
Even as this camp is in defiant mood, Group Lotus boss Dany Bahar isn’t wishing for his opponents to fade away. He told BBC Radio Norfolk: “Not at all (a problem) – for me, four (cars on the grid) are better than two. The controversy, that is something that has mainly been pushed up by media I would say, has been dealt with directly by our shareholders in Malaysia and with the owners of the 1Malaysia Racing Team and doesn’t really touch us.
“However, my personal opinion is that four Lotus brands out there is better than two. I have nothing against that.”
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Well said. Keep up the positive attitude guys…
why proton didn’t use the name like Proton-Lotus-Renault Racing, its better compare than Lotus-Renault..haha..P1 use P1 name as national car, our pride is there la, car for malaysia, image of malaysia.. But malaysian seems to be very happy already bcoz Lotus join them…Excuse me all, LOTUS not from us, and even Lotus name are from British…haa, the one who took our pride last time..haha…
why not just use the money on improving the car quality and competency? Even if Lotus win F1, i dont think ppl will sell their Ferrari and buy Lotus! Again…Proton’s big head syndromes getting worse.
thy wil create a strong brand awareness wic make ppl buy Ferrari n buy lotus as well
2 brilliant businessman. Holy Moly. Finally the picture is clear.
I think only one brilliant businessman and that is Tony. The othe one copy cat.
Tony Fernandez VS Dany Bahar, what a great showdown and lets see who will win….
Two malaysia giant AirAsia/NAZA VS Lotus/Proton, the loser are Malaysian….
Lotus-wanabe VS LOTUS original. Tony, y don loser work for other company for a day? tony looked like a great technician. HAHA
Oh yeah, stop bitching like a woman.
Just bring it on.
Only performers got the right to brag.
Then proton will handle 1 team?then lotus 1 team…then the slogan will be 2Lotus 1Malaysia!haha! If thats happen, 4 Lotus on the grid, 1 use Renault then 1 more?Still Cosworth?Waa….cant wait to see there got 4 Lotus car on the grid! Virgin sure ‘angin’!!!
dey, both team will be using renault engine, x baca paper ka?
still sleeping ka??? BOTH TEAM USE RENAULT ENGINE IN 2011 la…
Just race the damn cars and see who is faster already. Why make so much noise like the typical Malaysian politics.
Good reverse publicity to both Lotus brands though. A wishful thinking but hopefully they can finish top 4 in Sepang next year.
great.. it’s true Dany Bahar, better have four cars than 2.
This is even better than a typical Spanish telenova!!!!! Bring in the popcorns!
and worse if 4car DNF :lol:
For the Lotus brand, its great news. But was it a wise decision for Proton (through Lotus) to enter into F1 considering the price they have to pay? The bailout they have to grant to Genii Capital? Read between the lines. I’m inclined to think that Proton just went in for the sake of going in, just like they did on MV Agusta. I hope they better learn their lesson & do a proper job.
Comparatively Tony have done well. I was skeptical at the begining of this current season on Tony’s venture into F1 but he has pull-off a decent job and in the process gaining much friends in the paddock. Further, Tony’s team plans, build and race UNLIKE Proton whom will only be equity partners. I am sure decision making, team manmagement, driver development & racing decisions are still ran by Proton’s other partners. So, should Proton have entered F1?
last time around when PETRONAS partnered Sauber, they came out with the EO-1 engine…a high ouput high performance modern engine that unfortunately didn’t make it to our national cars due to various reasons (and yes politics is 1 of them….the fact that Proton at that time wanted to develop the Campro engine is another thing)….
hopefully, this time around, proton would be able to capitalize better on this opportunity…i mean last time around PETRONAS managed to do so and they’re not even a car company….
hopefully they would get better technical insight into engine technology and promotional values for the Lotus brand…and not to mention i’m still hoping proton would gain access into sharing some technology from the Renaul-Nissan alliance…
things that they definitely would not be able to do with TF team since it’s pretty much a private team and after all the brohuha with developing Malaysian motorsports industry, partnering local universities for research and development etc that was touted when they launched the team, i don’t see any of those happening or even mentioned by them now…
for me the only reason for TF to take on the Lotus brand for his team is for merchandizing purposes…making money out of the legendary brand…which is why Proton is unhappy with them since they’re not getting much cut out of it…else TF would probably named his team Team AirAsia in the first place…and i’m wondering why David Hunt didn’t take any legal action to TF when TF was saying that his team is the continuation of the original Team Lotus etc while certainly it’s not since Lotus Racing only recently purchased the rights from David Hunt…i mean if David Hunt was so adamant that he’s the owner of the brand, he should have been mad when someone was using it illegally…..
as far as i know, Petronas F1 Engine during Sauber-Petronas era wasn’t actually build from scratch, it was a modified ferrari F1 engine. The engineers were trained by ferrari engineer at first, then they work very closely throughout the seasons. most of the parts are also sourced from ferrari.
well the PETRONAS F1 engine during the Sauber Petronas era was actually a Ferrari engine in totality…it’s just re-badged as PETRONAS engine…but what i was talking about is the EO1 engine that’s rights to manufacture currently sold to Nanjing Automobile of China….
i mean the road going engine was an outcome of an engineering partnership with Sauber taken from the knowledge that they learn from operating the Ferrari engine…and the engine technology actually spawned into the FP1 Superbike (which unfortunately was never sold for road going users) and the current Rotax engine used in Bombardier Recreational Products (BRP) jet skis, snow mobiles and motorcycles (the engine is manufactured by Rotax with the IP rights hold by PETRONAS since PETRONAS does not have an engine manufacturing facilities)…and PETRONAS is not a car company and engine is really it’s niche product and hobby rather than a major business….thus why it has not been expanded…but Proton is a car company and Lotus is a well known automotive engineering company….so hopefully something good would come out of this…the informal press statement from Proton specifically mentions involvement from Lotus engineers in the team, something that they can’t do with TF team….
actually that motorbike was sold as road going…they must sold at least 100 to enter superbike championship last time…but not sold in malaysia if not mistaken
Great to see all are chipping in with their own perspective! It shows that the readers of this blog majority of whom are petrol-heads are very matured in thoughts & arguements. Kudos fellas, I learnt much!!
having MV Agusta is a good business decision but sadly they sold it off.
It was a great company with legendary brands.
while legendary, MV Agusta was bleeding too much money….not to mention the can’t seem to integrate the company into Proton….Lotus was easier to integrate since 1 of it’s core function is engineering services to automobile companies
MV Agusta is a different story…it definitely have some good engine technology but profitability is always an issue at such a niche motorcycle company….i mean even Harley Davidson sold back the company to the Italians who proton sold the company to previously because they just can’t get the integration to work..and we’re talking about 2 legendary motorcycle manufacturers here…
and guess what, HD sold MV Agusta for 3 Euros (which is still a good 2 Euro above proton sale price :) hehe) after buying the company $109 million…not to mention they had to put $29 million into MV Agusta coffers before selling…in comparison Proton paid about 70 milion Euros for the company back then (at a time when Euro is cheaper than the dollar) so HD took an even bigger hit than Proton when it comes to MV Agusta…
not a single point at all and u say a decent job? they ‘re still far behind than the 9th team. yea yea yea u can say they’re still in the 1st year of F1, in fact Tony and the gang kept saying the same thing. I guess we just hv to see whats their 2nd year in F1 got to say later next year…
Good attitude from Bahar and Fernandes
Keep it on
In US…any publicity is a “Good Publicity”.
they aso have another phrase which is “a good problem to have”
the only reason i think it is good to both parties is because obviously a competition is being made by having 2 Lotus on the grid, imagine now the tabloid keep talking about this, ever wonder when both different Lotuses grabbed the Pole and 2nd position ? that is where all the excitement comes from the F1
hahahaha bring back back raikkonen
Good for Lotus Brand bad for Proton
sorry cubey, but you’re way wrong on that. whatever is good for lotus, is good for proton, as proton owns lotus. if the lotus brand improves, and sells more cars and makes more money, so will proton as the owner.
he or she dunno anything about F1, auto industry…
free publicity for Lotus, end of the day, more exposure to “Lotus” brand, which indrectly, the car manufacture than the F1 team.
Great!
1Malaysia, 2 Lotus Teams.
4 cars is better than 2 when comes to probability to win race. Totally agreed!
Mitsu which we got Inspira from are not in F1 yet they make good cars. There could be some EGO issues going on here.
Mitsubishi are into rallies. Thats why they could extend knowledge to make good cars. The Lancer EVO is borne out of exeprience in the WRC while the Pajeros are borne from Dakar Rally.
Group Lotus could benefit much partnering with Renault in F1 as it would include technical participation unlike when GL was with TF’s 1M’sia racing team. Its not just playing with brand names and egos mind you.
it’s all politics, TF wants to hijack the Lotus brand la. Start with F1 first, then later got more bullets to request for Lotus cars to be sold to him!
how true.. 1st get permission from Group Lotus to use the “Lotus” name in F1, then after half year buy team Lotus right & said he’s now “Team Lotus” & own the right of the racing team name, why on earth? doesn’t he already have enough right??…who know what next he want to do?… to those who still cannot see, please don’t just give support blindly… follows the news since the beginning, from the creation of Tony’s team… trust me, even if u r not a rocket scientist you’ll still see the ‘direction’ of all this…
hmm.. looks like it’s not gonna be a 1-2 win at the grid, but will be 1-2-3-4 win for lotus.. hopefully.. hahaha
Why can’t they be like Red Bull Racing and Scuderia Torro Rosso? Both Lotus, both Renault….Sigh…
One is Renault sponsored by Lotus. The other one is Lotus powered by Renault. Go figure.
wrong. One is a partnership of Lotus Renault since Lotus bought 25% share of the racing outfit … which would use each others technical and engineering expertise in developing the car.
The other is just a name bought (although still in dispute in the UK courts on who rightly owns the name but thats a different stroy altogether) n pasted on a racing team which will use the same Renault engine.
I think you get it wrong, Scuderia Torro Rosso using Ferrari engine not Renault…..
my hat off to Danny Bahar. after all the nasty things said about proton and lotus by tony fernandez and co, all he had to say was this “However, my personal opinion is that four Lotus brands out there is better than two. I have nothing against that.”
now thats class!
yup.. me too bro.. already love this Bahar guy… :)
Dany Bahar comes from a shaddy background too and should not
be trusted 100%. He is actually a Turk with a Swiss PR.
What Proton is doing is totally contradicting what it said last year
when questioned by the public that it will not fork out a single sen
of tax payers money to sponsor the F1 race. WTH is going on now?
Just a waste of resources having two teams with the same engine
and time for the govt to remove whatever “protection & subsidies” accorded
to Proton.
can u proof they use tax payer money? between u said proton use tax payer money n ipta/ipts student use ptptn..which one clear using tax payer money + proof?
So what if he’s a Turk with Swiss PR..? U’ve proven yourself a bigot.
Racists man!
If we look at this from a positive angle – so long as they can cover their operational costs with sponsorship monies e.g. from Renault themselves and others – then Proton or Lotus’ need only fork out for the equity in the Renault F1 team. Big IF I know.
But look at the possible returns. Remember how Ferrari is always harping on about the use of F1 technologies in their road cars like the 599 GTO and 458 Italia? See how brilliant those cars are? Its this sort of edge Lotus needs to get ahead if they’re going to build, market and sell all their 5 – 6 new models.
More than just marketing synergies, there’s technology to be transferred from F1 to the road cars as well. Technologies that otherwise would possibly cost more to develop.
Well, that’s my theory anyways.
Tony, if you happen to read this, just change ur current so-call Lotus Team to—->
TONY – AIRASIA RACING F1 TEAM
the rear spoiler carries your title – TONY – MAKES YOU FLY
inspired by Williams – BMW and Red Bull – GIVES YOU WINGS…
i hope you read this… just ditch the whole damn saga…
even thou that lotus are reentering F1, i will still support ferrari and mclaren.. and also mercedes.. huahuahua.. lotus can’t even match with those 3 teams at all..
before this TF also ask proton to sell Group Lotus to him…coz he know how to manipulate Lotus Car, Brand and Lotus Racing…but b4 that happen proton already know TF trick..hahaha ‘ Kantoi…’
Now Everyone can Fly kite..
Naz@AE111 says:
even thou that lotus are reentering F1, i will still support ferrari and mclaren.. and also mercedes.. huahuahua.. lotus can’t even match with those 3 teams at all..
rpm: why not you compare youself with Mark Zuckerberg.. ?? have some sense when you say something.. lol..