Future of Lotus

[Bee]

Their hypercar will be out of almost everyone's range. I  wonder what it will have in common with (and how it will differentiate itself against) this...

 

 

To be honest, if Lotus's hypercar 'is' coming, it will be a halo car designed to show Lotus's potential, not in any way an indicator of prices to come or be marketed as a product that 99.9999% of current Lotus owners might be interested in. What 'may' well be of interest, however, is what technologies, features and ideas might drip down to forthcoming future models...

[Frickin_idiot]

3 hours ago, ChrisJ said:

Lotus need a proper 4 seater, and have done so ever since they canned the Excel. By not having one in their line-up they are excluding a huge swath of the population.

A quarter of the cars I've owned have been Lotus, but not one of the current crop interest me as I already have my 2-seater and want a 4-seater for the family - hence owning an Excel as well.

Can't wait for the new cars to appear - especially the SUV. My one worry is that they will be completely out of my price range.

 

Gotta agree with you ref four seater

[NedaSay]

3 hours ago, ChrisJ said:

Can't wait for the new cars to appear - especially the SUV. My one worry is that they will be completely out of my price range.

If they stick to what Popham said, then there may be no need to fear being priced out... The future products may be priced to match mostly Porsche across the board. If the next car is a sports car in the Evora price range then it is likely to be either a Cayman/Boxster or a 911 competitor so nothing out of the realm of mere mortals.... The hypercar however may be a different story.

[au-yt]

11 hours ago, C8RKH said:

I think you missed my point Andrew. I'm not saying that they don't/can't make great GT cars, (like they have in the past too), what i was saying was if the cars of the future are going to be produced at 150,000 units a year, AND be just like everyone elses (which the Esprit, Eclat, Elite etc were not in their time - the Esprit was way way ahead and better than the 308/328 for instance and what really compared to an Eclat?)  then they will not likely be for me.

It's the same reason why i would not buy a Nissan GTR, Audi R8, BMW M8 coupe etc. They are no doubt fast and capable cars, but they are just too "corporate" and look like every other one of their brethren in the garage.  

I bought my Evora (2nd one now) precisely because it was not a Porsche, Audi, Merc, BMW wannabe or look alike. I bought into the history of the brand, the exclusivity, the driving experience. I know progress mean things change, but if Lotus just becomes another mass market car, then I'll look somewhere else for my next car in the future, or, probably more likely, stay with the brand but go old and get an Esprit turbo or a clean Esprit S1!

Good point. LOTUS are at the end of an era, some will say good, I see it differently and to me it’s a bit sad. A number of great marques have found themselves corporatised to point of boring lookalikes with the distinguishing thing is the badge. I cite Maserati as a classic example. I owned a Maserati Khamsin for 23 years up until 2014, and won’t touch anything Maserati made after 1981. Lotus is about to head down a similar path at least the Elise will continue.

lotus also need to ensure they don’t play the, “we are very clever engineers card” again like they did with the M100 Elan. Fantastic car accolades from every jurno, that’s great. Sales flop for not meeting the customers expectation of being rear wheel drive. The car was faster across country for the average punter but that didn’t sell cars. 

Great future prospects for the company, but not for me. It’s the end of an era.

 

 

[NedaSay]

@C8RKH It is my interpretation that at some point in the future Lotus may become able to produce 150k. They will have the capability to do it but they may decide never to go that route. That's why they are not getting a dedicated factory but a shared one with high end Geely group products. For the time being, we know that Lotus has 5000 cap at Hethel and they will have capacities in the new factory but nobody said how many cars will be produced for Lotus on year one, it may be 10k or 20k, that was the ball park JMG set for the SUV. If they were to also produce a luxobarge , at some point, I guess they could add another 10k. They may decide to stick to these volumes for a while.

As of now, among the sportscar makers, only Porsche has managed to raise its production level to these crazy heights, the only other player that tried recently, Maserati, has failed. Bentley, Aston Martin, Lamborghini, and the likes are happy to produce less ( way less ) than 50k per annum. I do not put jaguar in this group as I always put them in the same bunch as the german luxury carmakers (Audi, BMW, Mercedes) but even Jaguar is not in that 150k bracket right now. Essentially that makes Porsche some sort of anomaly in the sportscar world, maybe they will remain an exception.

Edited April 11, 2019 by NedaSay

[CharlieBrown]

On 10/04/2019 at 06:39, C8RKH said:

I think you missed my point Andrew. I'm not saying that they don't/can't make great GT cars, (like they have in the past too), what i was saying was if the cars of the future are going to be produced at 150,000 units a year, AND be just like everyone elses (which the Esprit, Eclat, Elite etc were not in their time - the Esprit was way way ahead and better than the 308/328 for instance and what really compared to an Eclat?)  then they will not likely be for me.

It's the same reason why i would not buy a Nissan GTR, Audi R8, BMW M8 coupe etc. They are no doubt fast and capable cars, but they are just too "corporate" and look like every other one of their brethren in the garage.  

I bought my Evora (2nd one now) precisely because it was not a Porsche, Audi, Merc, BMW wannabe or look alike. I bought into the history of the brand, the exclusivity, the driving experience. I know progress mean things change, but if Lotus just becomes another mass market car, then I'll look somewhere else for my next car in the future, or, probably more likely, stay with the brand but go old and get an Esprit turbo or a clean Esprit S1!

 

 I hear you. My first Lotus was a 2011 Elise R, then a 2013 Evora NA and currently a 2017 Evora 400....Before that I had Porsche and muscle cars...I liked them but now I'm a Lotus driver only.

[Bibs]

[chipp]

Just smoke and mirrors?

 

A lot of activity around the track this morning though might be related.

 

chip

[Bibs]

I would have thought that anything required in Shanghai would already be there by now. 

[NedaSay]

Uh we used to get a lot more hyped up whenever Lotus gave us a date like this... Where is everyone? 

So uh what's up with all the yellow flame?

Edited April 12, 2019 by NedaSay

[Bee]

I think we all desperately want it to be a look at the new (interim) model but we're scared to commit ourselves to saying that out loud for fear of being slapped back down by some less interesting announcement!  🤣🤣

[Barrykearley]

It’s the new Esprit 🥳

[scotty435]

3 hours ago, NedaSay said:

Uh we used to get a lot more hyped up whenever Lotus gave us a date like this... Where is everyone? 

So uh what's up with all the yellow flame?

And it used to happen every week with a new edition, me for one can not wait

[Ccd]

I’ll give you a date: 7/18/19.  The official unveiling of the C8 mid-engined Vette.  Likely to impact most sports/supercars sold in North America.  Pricing has not been announced but speculation places pricing to begin around $60,000.  

[NedaSay]

Uh did a Lotus Cars website refresh just happened???

It appears they are now up to date, the US website only list the 400, the UK only list the  GT410. the Elise Sport 220 and Cup 250, the exige range still displays the Sport 350 and 410 as well as the Cup 430. the "F" there's even a configurator for body colours on the Evora page!!

Edited April 12, 2019 by NedaSay

[stephenwhyte]

Picture of the Cup 430 in the 410 section is a tad misleading.......and clearly a mistake. Also, an interesting strategy to show used examples of the car colour you’re speccing.......maybe not the cleverest approach when the customer at this point had new on their mind. Maybe just me?

[NedaSay]

^^they do look clumsy to me too. I guess the website is still pretty much work in progress but Lotus is now using the same website template and hopefully IT backbone as Volvo cars. Which means that they now have access to all the configurators they need but they elected not to push the envelop too much as they are focussing on the upcoming models and not the current offering.

 

Edited April 12, 2019 by NedaSay

[Brian Braddock]

Maybe the idea was to help dealers sell their stock and show customers what the colours look like in real life? 

This being the internet it has to be seen as a negative I guess!

Looks like some here have already forgotten how dire the old site was.

No 430s in any Exige 410 section that I can see either.

Edited April 12, 2019 by Brian Braddock

[NedaSay]

^^That would make sense. For me  the new website is assuredly a step in the right direction, and considering how much it is configurisable (is that a word?) there's a lot more to come for the current line up and the new sport car to be unveiled soon. Interesting enough there is no local version yet for the Chinese market nor does it have one for the Middle east and Japan, so clearly still a lot of modules will be implemented, It maybe a soft  launch before going fully live on the 16th of april.

 

[PAR]

10 hours ago, chipp said:

Just smoke and mirrors?

Mostly smoke and just three mirrors (1 inside, 2 outside)

[Bibs]

It's an interim website, don't panic. 

[PAR]

Prices still missing, Lotus new car prices are notoriously hard to find online!

[Advantage]

Is 16/04/09 when the new five year plan starts?

[ramjet]

New Citroen 2CV.

Oh wait, I'm on the wrong forum.

[au-yt]