Geely has announced that Feng Qingfeng, the vice president and chief technical officer of Geely Auto Group, will succeed Jean-Marc Gales as chief executive officer of Group Lotus. Feng first joined the Lotus board when Geely acquired a 51% majority stake in the Norfolk-based sports car manufacturer.
Gales, a former board member of the PSA Group, joins classic car specialist JD Classics as CEO. He first joined Lotus in 2014 to steer it out of a weary, loss-making era. His departure was due to personal reasons, and told Autocar that “it’s a very emotional day” and that it was “time to move on.” Gales also said, “Lotus has been in my heart for 50 years.”
Geely’s chief financial officer and Lotus Cars chairman, Daniel Donghui Li said, “Jean-Marc has stabilised and turned Lotus to profitability for the first time in the iconic brand’s history, with new industry-leading products and unique business models since joining in 2014.”
“Lotus is poised for the next phase of growth under Feng Qingfeng’s leadership, where its expertise in lightweight materials and sport cars-engineering will form part of the wider expansion of Geely ‘s automotive portfolio. At the same time I will welcome Jean-Marc‘s council as chief strategic advisor to myself and the board of directors,” he added.
Feng said “I am honoured to have been appointed to lead this iconic British sports car group. With Geely’s global synergies and total support, I am confident that Lotus has an exciting opportunity to achieve its full potential as a luxury sports brand, based around its engineering legacy and its future product pipeline.”
In 2017, Lotus sold 1,600 cars – an increase of 10% versus 2016 – and made profit for the first time in the company’s history. All models sold were produced at its plant in Norfolk, England.
Moving forward, Lotus is planning to introduce two sports cars by 2020, one of which is a halo model that will be positioned above the Evora. It could also switch to Volvo powertrains for selected models, particularly for its first ever SUV.
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Lotus Volvo Geely > all
Lotus, P1, Geely, Mesidis, VolvoCar, VolvoTruck > all
With a Chinese head, it cud open the door to China market.
Kowtow to Chinese head.
They turn Lotus to profitability for the first time.
Err nope. Mgmt was still under DRB when they made that historic feat.
Good a Chinese head is making progress. We need to change most GLC too. Cannot afford all the lepak and minum teh 8X a day in the kantin anymore
Most GLCs dun have kantin. The only GLC with kantin is P2… oh wai
Haaahaahaha…
goodbye to British Lotus
Hello Chinese lotus
Hello Chinese Volvo ?
Jaguar and Land Rover
Hello Indian TATA !!
Hello Malaysia P2 !!
So?
Jaguar, Land Rover doing good under Indian Tata.
Volvo pecah sales record 3 years in a row, going into 4th.
Fear the might of Geely empire!
Lotus, Volvo, Geely > all
I have noy seen a single s90 on the road. Pity.
But plenty of XC90s
Jean-Marc Gales steer Lotus out of a weary, loss-making era & now they appoint Mr Feng Qingfeng to make Lotus even better. That’s what I called confidence in your own product(people)
If you analyse the statements about Lotus’ “profit”, you’d see they are still not profitable, a malady they have suffered for decades. Terms like cash flow positive, profit before tax, amortization and interests, etc etc cannot hide the fact that it’s not a profitable business so far. The cars are nice though. I wish the new managers all the best in their efforts to make Lotus a self-sustaining business.
dont u think they dont know that?
At least China make better cars than
Taiwan Yue loong and Formosa Taiwan ( Daewoo) — all rubbish junk cars
This will mean the end of Lotus Cars and the beginning of another Geely product line using a different logo, like Volvo and Polestar and Lynk&Co and now Lotus. XC40 SUV with Lotus badge is next product, totally loosing the Lotus DNA and heritage. Same but it is done.
Goodbye lotus. Would rather see them out of business than give it to China