7 replies to this topic

[lower case writer]

does any one recall where exactly the assets of the former lotus are dispersed. by this i mean, who owns what as regards to the former f1 team, the road car production company, etc.

thanks

lcw

[Richard Jenkins]

The late James Hunt's brother, David, owns the rights to the Team Lotus name - theoretically, if Lotus were ever to return to F1, it would be either from him or through him.

[Peter Morley]

David Hunt owns the name Team Lotus and the last cars, pit equipment etc. as well as the office funriture and so on.
Seemingly everything except that was still in use, except the building and machinery.

The Chapman family have their collection of old cars and some drawings.
They run a business called Classic Team Lotus preparing & renting some of these cars out and selling off bits & bobs that they have hanging around.

Some car company owns the Lotus road car company/consultancy business.

But there were loads of other companies that were connected with the Lotus racing team etc.

Lotus Components was the company that sold the production race cars.
World Wide Racing had some connection with the F1 team (& Indy possibly).
And a whole load of others.

But the last version of the F1 team is owned by David Hunt.
But given it is so long since they were in F1 any Team Lotus entry would be treated as a new team, so you might as well start a new team called "Lotus Formula 1", or similar, to get the name back into F1, it would have just as much connection with the most important F1 team ever as relabelling some mediocre (or worse) F1 team.

[panzani]

The Lotus Group [it includes Lotus Engineering, Lotus Motorsport] is also Lotus Elise's maker. I think Opel is its owner. The site is here.

And the Classic Team Lotus Limited site is here. One can drive a type72 if he can afford it.

[lower case writer]

wow, excellent responses!


many thanks chaps.

lcw

[TFBundy]

I think Lotus Cars & Lotus Engineering are still owned by the Malaysian firm Proton who bought them from Artoli's Bugatti who bought them from General Motors.

Recently Proton were trying to buy MV Agusta too!

[Wuzak]

Originally posted by TFBundy
I think Lotus Cars & Lotus Engineering are still owned by the Malaysian firm Proton who bought them from Artoli's Bugatti who bought them from General Motors.

That is correct.

[Racers Edge]

[Team Lotus] : at this time has sold everything off...no cars left /no parts /no shop...only the name "Team Lotus" is left...David has been looking for a sponsor, now for along time, without any real positive results...( Sorry David it's fact!) My hat is off to him, but in reality his last best shot was to buy Arrows, before that Prost...and so on....You could only get into F1 these days by buying a existing team, and ask for a "blessing" from the currrent teams to change the name...NEXT: Minardi?