Future of Lotus

[PAR]

Basically, for a small SUV sold by the factory for £50k (RRP around £70k then), you would probably need to aim for 40,000 units per year to get your return on capital. That is assuming you get a 10% margin post depreciation.

Geely can afford those kind of numbers and considering how much they expanded Volvo, this is not necessarily a big risk for them. That clearly means SUV is core to that strategy.

[LotusLeftLotusRight]

Phew, when I saw the thread title I thought that was the asking price for the new Esprit.

[Bee]

I suppose it's not that large a figure given the $11b pumped into Volvo. With so much investment and expansion, however, it would seem clear that we can expect the two new SUVs to be produced in pretty significant numbers, and it makes me wonder whether the two 'all-new' sports cars, which we have been told to expect around 2020, will be taken back to the drawing board to make them competitors to the likes of Porsche etc. in ways they have simply not had the funds/resources to match before, i.e. interior quality, technology etc. Will the carbon-tubbed, track-focussed flagship model become the new Esprit? Either way, exciting news - the future  for Lotus certainly seems a whole lot more interesting!

[Mark Blanchard]

Biggest investment the company has ever had.  Lets hope it happens

Do I hear the scratching of pencils at Hethel again, drawing wedge shaped things?

 

[Kimbers]

http://europe.autonews.com/article/20180809/ANE/180809764/geely-said-to-mull-spending-nearly-2-billion-on-lotus-revival?cciid=email-ane-daily

now in automotive news.

 

[KAS-118]

Sad about the 25% reduction in UK sales - I wonder why that happened?

 

[KAS-118]

I see on their facebook page there’s a special 70 year celebration announcement at noon BST tomorrow- anyone have any ideas?

[NedaSay]

1.5B, so that is about enough to develop the two sports cars, whose development cost I anticipate to be much higher than what was the reported development budget for the Evora way back when, and the SUVs that will have to borrow from their Geely/Volvo stablemates. Hopefully the QC, marketing, dealer network and after sales services will be on point to help recoup that significant but not quite mind-blowing investment.  They haven't said if it is 1.5B over 2 years or 10 years, still it is much more than all of what Lotus got from Proton during their tenure.

The reduction in UK can probably be explained by the uncertainty surrounding the acquisition of the company last year and the fact that the lower priced models were axed.  Regardless Lotus had been looking at generating more revenue from a single car sale so I'd like to know what was the financial loss generated by this reduction in UK sales. Hopefully we get more info in due course and the new pricing applied to the exige will also be applied to the Elise and Evora. 

[Barrykearley]

That’s one hell of a party @Bibs is organising 👍

[Bravo73]

I think that @Bibs might have an inkling... 

[NedaSay]

Must be big considering they made a new miniwebsite just for it.

[KAS-118]

Just now, NedaSay said:

Must be big considering they made a new miniwebsite just for it.

Yeah, so more than just a limited edition of an existing car then 🙂

[NedaSay]

1 minute ago, KAS-118 said:

Yeah, so more than just a limited edition of an existing car then 🙂

We can only hope. But a new halo car teaser would not be illogical, we are within 1.5 year of a supposed new car launch it is time to get some hype around that future car.

That or they finally unveiled the refurbished factory with the skeleton building now complete.

No news on a Lotus presence at the Paris Motorshow...

 

[Likuid]

Geely considering pumping 2 billion into Lotus to compete with Porsche and Ferrari: https://autoweek.com/article/car-news/geely-considering-2-billion-revival-plan-lotus-report-says

[NedaSay]

I think the 1.5b thread should be merged it is related closely to this one imo.

[Likuid]

My bad I checked this one without looking if anyone posted a thread specific to this news.

[NedaSay]

The article  mentions a second Uk factory in the west midlands and a new design studio... Am I wrong to think that the second factory is the LEVC manufacturing centre in Coventry and the design centre would open/has opened on the same campus within the Geely LEVC facility upgraded with more staff.

[NedaSay]

23 minutes ago, Likuid said:

My bad I checked this one without looking if anyone posted a thread specific to this news.

no worries.

 

[100th_Idiot]

This is excellent news. Too much negativity about its only enough for this or that.

It's only positive. Geely have done well with Volvo. Give them a chance to do well with Lotus.

Just don't expect it to be the same Lotus as the past. It will build on the heritage but times have changed. Lotus must change with it.

Celebrate the history and look forward to the future.

[NedaSay]

Do you think the would dare building a successor to the Seven called the Seventy?

The Seven is the one milestone missing from the poster they created for the lotus70.com website.

[Mark Blanchard]

I hope the £1.5 billion also pays for proper marketing and PR.  That's what Lotus has been missing since the 1970s / 80s.

[Frickin_idiot]

Lotus is not an overnight fix, it’s gonna take years and years of continual investment to bring up to sustainability in my view. I’m not saying that it can’t be done, I am positive that this will be achieved.

 

 

[NedaSay]

Agreed, If we admit that Lotus has suffered from years of lack of investment, what they need now is a sustained, significant and perennial investment. However Geely is now treading in unknown waters. There's a lot of goodwill surrounding the Lotus moniker, however in terms of brand equity, it is a bit of an unknown quantity and as Kev said it, it may take years or multiple business plans, at least 2 more than probably 3 so 15 years of a steady investment to fully reestablish the brand. Starting with 1.5b is pretty much an electro choc but considering they are going to probably do a thorough retooling at the factory - already going on - hire more staff - in progress -  definitely expand dealer network on key market (North America, China...) and surely advertise aggressively (bring on racing program - hopefully) 

Therefore silly me does think that this is nothing but an opening salvo, a clear declaration of intent and a sign of how serious Geely is about having in their portfolio Brands catering for every niche, Polestar and Lotus being straight on luxury, Volvo, Emgrand being premium Lynk & Co (for the youth) and Geely being mass market (access premium in emerging market and homeland) and Proton catering for South East Asia.  I don't think Lotus will rack in 11b worth of investment that Volvo got, but when all is said and done I assume they will have had access to 3 to 5b. 

 

   

[TBD]

Given the funds it can go a lot faster than you think. Consider how fast Tesla has grown, in about ten years from a barnshed putting batteries in a LOtus Elise to todays output of 5,000 cars a week. That is roughly 100 times the output of Lotus.

 

[C8RKH]

I hope given th experience and expertise already at Lotus, and now being able to be accessed through Volvo, london Taxi, Geely etc. that lotus will do a rather bet job at manufacturing and forecasting than Tesla has ever done.  My big worry with Tesla is that it is a hyped up Ponzi scheme just waiting to crash. But then, i could be completely wrong.

Back to Lotus I do hope they bring back Motorsport. i do hope that they invest in the legacy and bring back/create a factory backed programme (spares and refurbs/renovations) for the older models. Jaguar, Aston Martin and others are investing heavily in this area and owners are prepared to pay to get the work done.

Having the ability to schedule a service at the factory would be superb. What better excuse for a 1,000 mile road trip for me from Scotland to Hethel than to go th factory, get my car serviced whilst I look around Team Lotus and the new (I hope) factory visitor centre with access to see the new cars being made. I'd happily create a 5 day road trip around that and get satisfaction from a "factory stamp" in my Service Book!  It needs to be about the ownership experience.  Keep current customers loyal and delighted whilst you drag in the new.

Roll on a bright future for Lotus,  but if they go all high end (and therefore expensive) I'll have to look elsewhere for my next sports car.