Having now come under Geely parentage, Lotus is now in an improved position in terms of development resources available for its future products. Traditionally famed for sports cars, the British automaker will be allowed to step out of its usual niche on the condition it preserves the marque’s tradition of lightweight and exemplary handling, chief executive Phil Popham told Automotive News Europe.
“We are a sports-car brand, and we are developing an all-new sports car, which you will see towards the end of next year. It won’t be on sale, but you’ll see it,” said Popham. “It won’t be an electric car, it will be a car that is within the price band that we have today in our range of products, and it will be a car that will appeal to a greater audience,” he said.
The forthcoming new model will be about on-road as well as on-track handling and dynamics, Popham added, saying that investments are being put into facilities at Hethel for the production of the forthcoming car.
Beyond the new sports car, Lotus will also be investing in a new platform that will be the basis of multiple new models in the future, Popham said. The firm has the access to the Geely group’s resources and technology to enable the company to go beyond two-door models, though it has yet to be decided if those platforms will be shared with Geely stablemates such as Volvo, Polestar and Lynk & Co.
“We will utilise the resources of the group. The purchasing power they’ve got and the leveraging of price and quality comes with volume. If we are able to look at some commonality of parts that were appropriate, we will do that,” Popham said in terms of parts-sharing from brands within the group, noting that the resource-sharing approach enables the British brand to ‘really focus on what differentiates a Lotus.’
The automaker will however continue to use outsourced engines due to company limitations. “We are never going to be big enough to produce our own engines,” the CEO said, though Lotus is not constrained for where it gets its engines from. The sports car maker currently adapts Toyota engines for use in its model ranges, and Popham sees opportunities to use engines from within the group.
Fringe models developed for other marques that have become sought-after, such as the Lotus Carlton and the Lotus Cortina have helped build the credibility of Lotus’ engineering and brand, though it isn’t the company’s focus at the moment, Popham said. “I wouldn’t rule it out in the future,” he noted.
Will Geely money mean the influx of autonomous driving elements into future Lotus models? “Geely as a group is investing a lot of money on (autonomous driving), and we have the opportunity to benefit from that. But we’ve got to understand what that means in the context of a car that is built for the driver and for the driving experience,” the Lotus CEO noted. Good news, it seems, remains for the keen driver.
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C’mon Lotus lads! Hail Geely China !!
Fringe models, like the satria GTi too. More collaborations with proton please
The reason Geely wants Lotus is that it can learn how to make better cars not Lotus to learn from Geely. The British automotive is very advanced looking at the cars of Jaguar, Range Rover, Aston Martin and Rolls Royce. British engineers made them.
lmao All the brits car brand you mentioned were in deep bottom red until beg to be rescue by foreign auto makers.
So does the engineer job hopping to foreign lands.
all the brit brands were sold because of poor financial management and high cost . that doesn’t invalidate his point that mini,rolls, RR are high tech cars designed by brits
Lotus’ expertise is in ride and handling, and maybe advanced construction method with its years of aluminium and composite materials usage. Lotus certainly can learn how to improve build quality and fit finish from Geely/Volvo. Not to mention safety and hybrid propulsion systems too.
Now Lotus doing extremely well under Geely leadership. Last time under Proton, it was doing so badly and losing money.
I love China. I love Geely. I wish more China companies come to Malaysia and run it like how Li Chunrong runs things.
Look at Proton, after Li Chunrong took over, Proton sales are increasing. This is because Li makes the lazy Proton workers work hard.
No wonder for 40 years Lotus never make a profit until Proton & DRB bought over. They needed a foreign CEO from Proton to make them great again. I see
fake news. Lotus was making money until Proton bought them up 10 years ago.
Try harder john
Lolz! Next u think ur papa is oso john. Sori but im not the john that makes pizza. Hahahaha!
Looking forward to a bright future. Combine the Volvo finish and Lotus handling ,slip a amg under the hatch and wow you have a winner ,well worth over the 100k Mark….
No way put an AMG in there… Stick with Toyota.
If they were going to change, a Volvo engine would make sense…