Wells Vertige

[mik]

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new- ... 023-208bhp

Now Lotus has stopped making the Elise - could this fill the gap for some? I’m not sold on the looks personally, although I guess the gullwing doors will make ingress/egress easier than the Elise/Exige - which can be tricky - particularly if you are a bit chub - so I am told anyway.

[ZedLeg]

Not to repeat myself but £50k back to basics sports cars by British manufacturers never succeed. Real car guys (RCGs) always say they wish there were more but in the position they will to a man buy a second hand Porsche.

[mik]

I don't necessarily disagree with that.

More pics on their website.

Circa £50k as Zed notes
208bhp
6-speed manuel
850kg

Those side windows look rubbish.

[Mito Man]

They've managed to make it look like it was designed about 10 years before a series 1 Elise but not in a good way.

[Rich B]

Sports cars need to be visually appealing too. That's awkward and ugly.

[Sundayjumper]

Like a TVR but less cohesive.

[duncs500]

I like the formula obvs, but the design needs refinement. If it drives well and they hone the looks, could be interesting. If they could knock £10k off the price I think they'd sell a few.

[Rich B]

I like the formula obvs, but the design needs refinement. If it drives well and they hone the looks, could be interesting. If they could knock £10k off the price I think they'd sell a few.

basically, if they could totally change it, then they might sell some to other people.

[Zonda_]

Is there not a market for someone buying the Elise tooling and continuing production like the Seven and Elan?

[Ascender]

WTH is that!?

Like @Zonda_ says, I'm amazed there's not an arrangement to be made for someone to keep producing the Elise in some form or other.

And as has also been said, its a great idea in theory, but pulling off this sort of thing at any sort of scale with good reliability and customer service while at a reasonable price to tempt people away from the other options is always tricky.

[scotta]

WTH is that!?

Like @Zonda_ says, I'm amazed there's not an arrangement to be made for someone to keep producing the Elise in some form or other.

And as has also been said, its a great idea in theory, but pulling off this sort of thing at any sort of scale with good reliability and customer service while at a reasonable price to tempt people away from the other options is always tricky.

Although a Caterham Elise could be a tempting offer. Duratec engine from the 620R in an Elise with the Cup kit fitted. Yes please.

[Rich B]

Even if they could be made to be financially, H&S, etc compliant, Is it really in lotus' interest to have someone else creating Lotus Elises though?

[Zonda_]

Even if they could be made to be financially, H&S, etc compliant, Is it really in lotus' interest to have someone else creating Lotus Elises though?

They must see it as a market they want to move away from or they wouldn't have stopped production.

[Sundayjumper]

I don't imagine it's quite so black & white. Just because you don't want to do something, doesn't mean you're happy for someone else to do it.

[Rich B]

Even if they could be made to be financially, H&S, etc compliant, Is it really in lotus' interest to have someone else creating Lotus Elises though?

They must see it as a market they want to move away from or they wouldn't have stopped production.

or a market that they can't satisfy the various legislations for, whilst still making money.

[ZedLeg]

Bear in mind that when Caterham started making the 7, Lotus was still owned by Colin. It's probably much more complicated to sell manufacturing stuff now, especially as they're still using the same process on new cars.

[Holley]

Heard Matt Pryor and Steve Cropley talk about it in there podcast (very much two old blokes talking in a pub, but I quite like that).

Apparently only intend to sell 50 before moving on and Autocar seem to rate it.

Personally I would rather have a GR86 at £20k less, but can see why someone might want something more unique and British.

[Zonda_]

I don't imagine it's quite so black & white. Just because you don't want to do something, doesn't mean you're happy for someone else to do it.

Well it’s not like they haven’t done it before!

[Jobbo]

Heard Matt Pryor and Steve Cropley talk about it in there podcast (very much two old blokes talking in a pub, but I quite like that).

Apparently only intend to sell 50 before moving on and Autocar seem to rate it.

Personally I would rather have a GR86 at £20k less, but can see why someone might want something more unique and British.

I like the Autocar week in motoring podcast, plus they've had May and Harris as guests so it's not always just Prior and Cropley. Not listened to all of them yet though.

As for the Vertige, selling 50 seems a very pragmatic aim. That's £50k times 50, so £2.5m total revenue. Deduct the VAT and it' a bit over £2m. How much are the material/parts costs for a car; maybe 25% though I think that's optimistic, but still: let's be generous and say £10k per unit. How on earth is there any money in the coffers to develop and build the thing? Even with Mr Wells buying his premises - so they'll have a value later down the line - the costs of building them and complying with legislation can't make it viable.

Good luck to him; it's been a long time since we've had a plucky British maker start-up. But I hope he's already financially secure because this is a vanity project at best.

[duncs500]

In the context of a £47k CTR, this for £50k is not as outrageous as some of the entry point some of these start ups target for what you're getting. Still too expensive to shift a decent volume, but then maybe they're happy at that level. Will be interesting to see if there's any interest on the likes of SELOC, as that's full of a lot of their target market.