Regent Street, London, was where new Lotus owners – DRB-HICOM opened their Originals flagship store and to grace its opening were Business Secretary, Vince Cable and His Excellency Dato' Sri Zakaria Sulong, Malaysia High Commissioner to the United Kingdom.
The DRB-HICOM were in England to visit the Hethel-based headquarters and were given a tour of the production line, design studio and engineering facilities before taking out a few of Lotus for some fun out on the test track.
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Dato’ Sri Hj Mohd Khamil Jamil, Group Managing Director DRB-HICOM & Executive Chairman of PROTON was also present during the opening of the state-of-the-art store that's spread over 4,800 sq. feet of floor space in a landmark building that once housed the famous Café Royal (a short distance from Piccadilly Circus), who said “Group Lotus has some of the most technically gifted and talented members of the automotive industry and we are determined that they will be given the opportunity to flourish under the new management. DRB-HICOM has invested new funds and it is our job to make sure that investment is used in a way that can drive the company forward. We are working on a number of new developments and are confident of the company’s bright future as we continue to leverage on our engineering excellence and innovation culture. Meeting with Dr Cable and hearing about his continued support for this great British brand was very heartening.”
Business Secretary, Vince Cable said: “I'm pleased to have been invited to meet with DRB-HICOM on what is a milestone day for Lotus.Lotus is an important part of the UK’s automotive sector, and I particularly welcome DRB-HICOM’S continued commitment to the future of Lotus in Norfolk.”
The new Originals store brings clothing, memorabilia and luxury items in the form of four ranges to those who hold the Lotus brand dearly in their hearts and minds in the form of:
- Lotus Originals: For current and young Lotus owners, which features a relaxed range of clothing aimed at the 25 to 45-year-old age group.
- The Lotus Heritage collection: Inspired by the glorious racing days of the Sixties and Seventies and possesses a retro look that’s aimed at the higher-end of the market.
- Lotus Performance collection: A reflection of the brand’s high-performance engineering soul that includes polo shirts, T-shirts and outdoors wears.
- Lotus F1 wear: Depicting a fast, fun and exciting range of clothing and racing accessories.
During the opening of the Originals store, Lotus also took the opportunity to launch their newly developed supercharged V6 equipped Lotus Exige S that’s due to roll-off their Hethel production line before the end of this month (July, 2012).
It’s gotten itself a new nose, body lines, a new rear diffuser, a tighter rear anti-roll bar, a sweet 348bhp jab from the Evora's 3.5L mid-mounted Toyota V6 with a Harrop supercharger bolted onto the engine, helping to twist out 400Nm of torque. Basically, its the same engine that's been transplanted over from the Evora and so was the 6-speed manual transmission.
But more importantly, it’s begun to receive more electronics with the inclusion of ESP (Electronic Stability Program) that has been embedded within the Dynamic Performance Management (DPM) system that allows the driver to choose one of four driving modes – Normal, Sport, Race or Tour.
The front gets 17” rims up front while the rear goes a little larger with 18” rims and both lightweight alloys get wrapped in Pirelli P-Zero Corsa (205/45 R17 Front and 265/45 R18 Rear) that’s specifically bespoke for the Exige S. In any case, both tyre and rim combination houses larger cross-drilled discs to help keep the speed of the Exige S in check since it’ll get you to 100kmh in under 4s, another 4 more seconds to 160mkh and onto to a top speed of 274kmh.
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