Lotus buys 100 per cent of Lotus to become… Lotus

Big news for fans of the word ‘Lotus’: Lotus Technology has bought 100 per cent of Lotus Advance Technologies to become… still Lotus? Yes, still Lotus.

Lotus Tech – that’s the Chinese-bit of the company that builds the electric stuff – has done some hardcore bidness to acquire 100 per cent of Lotus UK (weirdly called ‘Lotus Advance Technologies Sdn Bhd’), which of course is the Hethel bit of the company that builds… the Emira.

The deal, we’re told, “brings Lotus’ iconic British sportscar business, engineering consultancy and next-generation intelligent vehicle technologies together under a single corporate structure”. Fans of Lotus Cars will of course remember the company’s long… let’s say ‘nuanced’ ownership structure over the years.

The deal, it is claimed, will allow stronger collaboration between engineering, manufacturing, product development and commercial things too, “while streamlining governance and accelerating the integration of capabilities across the wider business”.

“Lotus is one brand and one strategy, and from today it is one business,” said Lotus Tech boss Qingfeng Feng. “Everything that makes Lotus a Lotus – the engineering, the obsession, the discipline – now sits in a single organisation.

“This is an important step in advancing our Focus 2030 strategy and embarking on the next chapter of Lotus’ global revitalisation.” Ah yes, ‘Focus 2030’: that Big Shiny Plan involves a big shiny V8 hybrid supercar with more than 986bhp (that’s it up above) codenamed ‘Type 135’.

All things going to plan, we’ll see it in 2028, using a version of the hybrid setup currently buried within the Eletre X SUV. Focus 2030 also recommits Lotus to the Emira, including a more powerful, lightweight version, and ‘restoring financial discipline’. One suspects this merger is meant to assist that noble ambition.