Having ended production of the Elise, Exige, and Evora back in 2021, the only model produced by Lotus in 2022 was the Emira. As for the Eletre, Norfolk’s electric SUV didn’t hit the assembly line until earlier this year while the Porsche Taycan-rivaling sedan won’t be in the hands of customers until later in 2024. To make matters worse, there were also supply chain bottlenecks in the second half of 2022 that further put the brakes on deliveries.
Consequently, Lotus was only able to ship 576 cars last year, a massive drop compared to 2021 when 1,566 vehicles were delivered. Equally worrying is the £145.1 million loss incurred in 2022, which followed another £86.6 million loss the year before. To cut costs, Lotus is slimming down its organizational structure by looking to eliminate as many as 200 jobs.
The automaker’s UK operations will be impacted by this decision since Lotus told Autocar and Top Gear the proposals to eliminate up to 200 jobs pertain to the Hethel and Warwickshire base. Engineering and administrative roles are mainly targeted as the job cuts will not affect people who build cars. In fact, the company expects to assemble a record number of vehicles in 2023 by ramping up production of the Emira – its last ICE car ever – and of the China-made Eletre SUV.
The long-promised Evija still has to be delivered, and surprisingly, not all 130 cars planned for production have been sold. The first electric hypecar shipments to customers are scheduled for August. We’ll remind you the official debut took place four years ago, in July 2019.
Lotus is also working on an electric sports car that was supposed to be co-developed with Alpine. However, the two companies unexpectedly decided to part ways a couple of months ago. If everything goes according to plan, it should arrive at some point in 2026 as an all-Lotus effort. It’ll have to face a worthy adversary from day one considering Porsche has promised to launch an electric replacement for the 718 lineup in 2025.
