Hethel....The begining of the end

[daveA]

Hi

I dont know if anyone else has seen this , but a friend of mine asked me about this..........

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/mo ... broad.html

daveA

[ailwyn]

There are 4 simple facts to consider:
1. Lotus is no longer a solely British brand... the same as TVR/MG/Rover... and the list goes on.
2. At a time of unpopular public spending cuts the gov't is going to be risk averse, and this would be a risky loan... if it weren't then they would be able to raise this "commercial" loan from the banks. We are in a recession.. look what that did to Lotus when they released the M100...
3. If they were to loan the cash to Lotus, then they would have to lend to the steel maker in Sheffield and to every other British business that came asking.
4. Why is the cash not coming from Proton? It's because they are not willing to take on the risk of the new models not selling, so why should the British taxpayer

Don't get me wrong, I would like to see Lotus expand in the UK, unfortunately off-shoring is still flavour of the month, be grateful that the engineering/design/HQ is not going with the production line as there is no need to keep any of the operation in the UK. Let's face it in terms of new sportscars Lotus would probably end up with a better reputation if it moved to Italy, Germany or Japan. Anyone that thinks being a quaint British brand with a load of nostalgia is enough to keep them in business is somewhat deluded.

[DavidEJM]

Good post and well put.

I too am sad to see that this may be another manufacturer leaving the UK but as Ailwyn says, if it were a viable commercial proposition there would funds coming from the parent company if the banks are too risk averse.

[superbad]

There is more than meets the eye here. New Lotus supposedly has a $1 billion investment lined up for Bahar to turn it into British Ferrari- now they can't get a bank loan for $80 million and are forced to turn to the government?

[Dave Eds]

the point is that they will get a loan, but from another goverment - Italy!

[tb10]

The real reason for the Government not loaning Lotus the money is due to our membership of the EU. It is deemed to be 'anti-competitive' in the same way the government could not save Rover.

Furthermore after December 2010 Lotus can only export the 1.8 models outside of the EU because of EU legislation governing vehichle emmissions relating to top of the range cars. http://www.elise-r.co.uk/category/lotus/

Also big cash incentives are being offered to firms such as Dell in Ireland who moved to Poland: http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/fin ... 31107.html Twinnings Tea who are also moving to Poland http://www.thegrocer.co.uk/articles.asp ... &id=205641 and Peugeot who have gone to Slovenia: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/2906 ... works.html all funded by the taxes you and I pay yet get no benefit from ie investment in the infrastructure and manufacturing economies in Eastern Europe.


So there you have it, far from being a trading agreement when the 1972 European Communites Act was signed it has essentially become the death of our country. Mind you it's a good job we wern't in the Euro!!

Regards


John

PS Steve Jobs has offered to help out Eire's financial problems by buying the country.................he's going to rename it iLand

[Steve_P]

We can throw billions at fat cat *ankers but we can't lend money to British based manufacturing!? Governments
need to look at why we are in this financial mess; it's decades of not backing great engineering and innovation
achievements with proper manufacturing and commercialisation. There has been a fundamental lack of belief by
successive UK governments in our own capabilities, the result of which has been the loss of world class skills and
capabilities. Aviation is just one example, the French turned Concorde into Airbus! The plane may not have been
profitable but the knowledge infrastructure and skills base that came out of that programme were.

If Lotus were trying the make mass market cars then financially it makes complete sense to build abroad, but surely
part of the consumer appeal of spending a significant (given where Lotus are heading) amount of money on a British sports car is
that it is built in Britain, even if some component parts are sourced from abroad. A Ferrari built in South Africa or a Rolls
Royce built in Mexico just doesn't do it.

Surely we should be doing all we can to protect and build value for UK plc through forward thinking UK based companies such
as Lotus otherwise we can look forward to the banks investing our money until it's all gone

[lotusgirlmarie]

It's a sad state the world is in. Nothing is as it seems. Asian Lotus, Mexican VW, Canadian Honda.... It's all boggled. Who actually makes their own product anymore?

[Don.Hasi]

. Mind you it's a good job we wern't in the Euro!!

Hm... It is this case just the other way round... If this sadly will happen with the production of the lotus cars, the EU will profit alone and no fund of it could help with the money that is not "allowed". So sad, but the postings before are interesting: how could this "small" loan cancel the complete plan of hundreds of millions £ ? And the experiences with DeLorean and m100 haven't helped either I would suppose...

Mary: Porsche, it's now built with VW-power


Edit: btw... End of Lotusdays... Have a look at the new lifestyleshop.... And search for a nice keyring... You will find any other discussion will be obsolete

[JohnSlovenia]

As an diversion.- tb10 if he reads the Telegraph article will see it is Slovakia Not Slovenia mentioned. In Slovenia a modern country, bordering and similar to Austria, is produced some Renaults. The new twingo has just been announced for 2013. But like elsewhere here has been lay-offs and cut backs.
Only France and Germany seem to have protected their car industries. But what products does England produce? What industry do we have?