Lotus breaks out with new Eletre electric SUV

Lotus Cars recently revealed its first SUV, which is itself a radical step for the purist British sportscar brand. But the new battery-electric Eletre also breaks ground in being Lotus's first 5-door production vehicle and is likely to be the company's first product to sell in significant volume. The Eletre will be built at a new production facility in Wuhan, China, and features an aluminum body.

Known internally as the Type 132, Eletre will use Lotus's new Electric Premium Architecture (EPA), which has been designed to be easily adapted to accommodate batteries and powertrain components for a range of vehicle sizes from C+ to E+, as well as intelligent driving technologies. The Eletre is the first of these models and will be joined by two others built at the Wuhan plant. One of these is expected to be a smaller electric SUV. Lotus expects to sell around 100,000 Eletres annually, with principal markets in China, Japan, Europe and the U.S. Still headquartered in Hethel, England, since 2017 Lotus Cars has been majority-owned by Zhejiang Geely Holding Group.