Team Lotus principals buy Caterham - confirmed

[Frederik]

nog wat beeldmateriaal

[electroshock]

Voorlopig stelt het niet veel voor, een goed nieuws show met een Caterham in Team Lotus livrei.
Maar het is overduidelijk een zoveelste masterzet in een lange schaakwedstrijd.

Tony is, zo lijkt het eens te meer, voor alles een gewiekste zakenman met zin voor creatief ondernemerschap, daarenboven een goede communicator, een liefhebber van british motoring heritage en met passie voor het product, zowel hypertech F1 als lowtech Caterham. Duidelijk een man met een plan.

De puzzelstukken worden stilaan samengepast.
Ik zie ze nog ooit een Caterham in elkaar steken die perfect in de lijn ligt van de Elise S1/S2 ...
Laat Bahar maar (on-)rustig upmarket moven, Tony Fernandes zal met hulp van Ansar Ali het gat in de markt wel vullen, zo lijkt het.

Heikki heeft er ook zin in zo te zien. Doet me trouwens denken aan Jarno die in Jordan-tijden nog achter stuur van de Caterham kroop met de hayabusa(?)-motor in het vooronder.

Dawn of a new era is toepasselijk, maar helaas voorzien van een dure copyright.

De kritische opmerking van Exploded over een wolf in schaapskleren is wellicht ook terecht, 'gewiekst' moet misschien vervangen door 'gehaaid'.
Ik duim alvast voor het verder verloop.

[electroshock]

Korte round-up van de presentatie in Duxford
(Fernandes shortly mentioning the magic words 'affordable' & 'lightweight',
zo hoor ik het graag ).


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbtYylF51Ns&NR=1


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lq1IDcZfbbE


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkHyDD_Pdi8


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qh7tTCqhPfM


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4foaan1aXOg


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZW6u7_EGCE


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUwZiuRyGTM

[Frederik]

Ik anticipeer op de situatie en heb bijgevolg www.caterhamforum.be & www.caterham-forum.be geregistreerd en gekoppeld aan het forum onderdeel Seven & replika's.

Als het er ooit van komt, kunnen we uitkijken naast vaste subforums of misschien zelfs alleenstaand forum, maar dat is erg verre toekomstmuziek

[electroshock]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-13226028

[Jeroenbox]

ik vond mijn Exige RGB niet echt affordable met een prijs boven de 50K. Prima plan om goedkope wagens te gaan maken voor Azië maar niet met een Lotus badge erop. die Caterhams zijn overigens voor wat je ervoor krijgt ook niet heel goedkoop. dat affordable zie ik helemaal niet zitten.

al dat vergelijken met AirAsia dat TF kocht 3 dagen na 9-11 en dan nu Team Lotus en Caterham in datzelfde rijtje zetten en na een poosje naar de beurs te brengen vind ik een behoorlijke belediging van beide merken. Behoorlijk ongepast ook om te zeggen dat je wacht tot Lotus omvalt om het daarna voor een appel en een ei te kopen.

Alsof het besmeuren van de naam Lotus niet al genoeg vervelend was wordt nu ook de naam mijn Caterham besmeurd. zorgelijk zorgelijk zorgelijk

Ik stel voor het Lotus dat we kennen te laten sterven. We rijden dan verder in de klassieke Lotussen. Alles wat na 2010 komt is wat mij betreft geen Lotus meer.

[electroshock]

De goedlachse TeamLotus testdriver Davide Valsecchi over zijn Caterham experience.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7CXdIItzU0

[electroshock]

Just in case, voor hen die het dubbel-interview op pistonheads gemist hebben.

CATERHAM SALE: THE FULL STORY

PH talks to both Tony Fernandes and Ansar Ali to find the real story behind Caterham's new ownership


'Team Lotus Enterprise buys Caterham'. There's a headline to send internet forums and chatrooms into a frenzy of speculation and comment. Another independent British sports car company lost to a foreign buyer, in this case Tony Fernandes, the Malaysian multi-millionaire airline owner who also helped bring back the Lotus name to Formula One.

So, does this move mark the beginning of the end for the much-loved Dartford-based maker of extreme road cars and trophy-grabbing racers? After all, things didn't work out so well for TVR once the young Russian, Nikolai Smolenski, got his hands on that company...

Of course, short of a crystal ball there's no guaranteed way to know for sure, but PistonHeads was given exclusive access to the two key players in the union between Team Lotus and Caterham: Ansar Ali, who has owned the company for the past six years (having previously worked at Lotus), and Tony Fernandes, frontman of the new owners, Team Lotus Enterprise, the company also responsible for the Team Lotus F1 outfit.


Tony Fernandes
Initially it's perhaps not so reassuring to hear Caterham's new owner confess that, "I'm not really a petrolhead and until recently I didn't have much interest in road cars."

In fact, until a couple of days ago, and despite having worked on the Caterham deal for the past four months, the amiable and talkative Malaysian hadn't even been in a Seven, much less actually driven one. And he hadn't visited the Dartford factory.

"Two days ago was my first time out in a (Caterham) car and I was scared shitless by Simon (Lambert - Caterham's motorsport manager) as he roared through the Dartford area - I kind of wanted him to stop, but then he just kept going quicker!

"Then I had a go and didn't get it out of third gear, it just felt so fast. But when you drive a Seven it feels a spectacular experience - you get out of it and feel a new person, it's so different to any other car. Formula One and Caterham, the emotion is just the same. Heikki (Kovalainen, Team Lotus driver) drove the car today (at the Duxford-based announcement of the takeover) to do doughnuts for the crowd and he was blown away by it - we had to tell him to stop!"

Enthusiasm for the product is all well and good, but might not Fernandes blunder in and upset the workings of a tightly knit team that has been running a successful business in recent years? "I met everyone at Dartford the other day and they're a really great team, a unique team. And Ansar is so passionate and so knowledgeable; I will just let him get on with it. I believe in people; my role is to help with a strategic vision."

Fernandes is maybe understating his role here, as he's also bringing significant investment to the table, of a magnitude that should allow Caterham to pursue some development avenues previously blocked off by lack of capital. Not that the company is about to go wild with ambitious new model programmes and abandon its past.


Having gotten involved in Formula one, particularly with a Lotus connection, Fernandes understands the importance of heritage.

"The Seven is the Seven - it can't be touched. And while it's a very important car to the British and to a lesser degree parts of Europe and Japan, we can now use the F1 platform to introduce it to new territories."

The core of the Seven's appeal will be in motorsport, reckons Fernandes, and with the near-inevitability that the Caterham name will soon appear on the Team Lotus F1 cars, it will have extra credibility in emerging markets such as China and India. The ultimate plan is for Caterham to create a motorsport 'ladder' with its base supported by karts, rising up through various Seven series, endurance models, single-seaters, and sitting on the top rung the Formula One cars.

And what of the Formula One connection, will it really have any impact on Caterham in the short- to mid-term future? "I want to see some of the tech from our F1 team provide the inspiration for our road cars, not at the very high end, but in £20-30,000 cars. We've made our F1 racing cars more accessible and affordable than previous generations and I believe that Caterham offers the same things."

With the prospect of Lotus moving the Elise more upmarket, could there be an opportunity for Caterham there? Fernandes doesn't answer directly, yet his wry smile hints at where his mind might be wandering. "We have lots of dreams for the future, but the reality right now is taking Caterham into other parts of the world to grow.

"There's definitely a market for creating more race series with the Seven. And there may be a market that others have abandoned for an affordable sports car..."

Other ideas also ricochet around his fertile and fast-moving mind. "We could ultimately create an engineering division," he muses. "We're very good at composites, for example. And it would be great to have a car factory and a race team and a test track all together in the same place."


Ansar Ali
Ansar is an intense bloke. He takes even the slightest criticism to heart. Today he's nervous and on stage during the press conference momentarily forgets his speech; he has to drag written notes out of his pocket. He's desperately concerned about how people will view the sale of Caterham.

So concerned, in fact, our interview starts with him asking the questions. "Tell me honestly," he implores, "do you think I've done the right thing? Do you thing I've sold out?"

Well, Mr Ali, we were rather hoping you'd tell us. And then he does. "If I didn't believe this was right for Caterham then I wouldn't have done it. When I first met Tony (Fernandes) I knew that it was right, and the more I know of him, the more I believe that.

"He's very passionate about Caterham and has the drive to ensure we will always produce cars that are accessible to all. At the Seven's 50th anniversary I stated that the company would be around in another 50 years, but to be honest I'm not sure I truly believed that. Now, however, I really do believe Caterham will be around in 2057, for the Seven's 100th anniversary."

Ali realises that everyone's first fear about the new ownership of Caterham will be what happens with the Seven. But while he starts with a word of warning, he's otherwise very positive and reassuring about Caterham's core offering. "The Seven as it stands will eventually be outlawed as a road car. Britain is now the only country that allows the self-build of the Seven for road registration. But we'll continue to evolve the car until the legislators stop us doing it."


How much evolution can there possibly be, though? Ali explains: "The further you move away from Dartford, the more hardcore our customers become, particularly in places like Germany. So it's not inconceivable that we could produce an R500 that passes EU5 emissions regulations. That would certainly open us up to a much wider European market."

Being a motorsport devotee, Ali is excited by the notion of the Team Lotus connection allowing Caterham to expand its racing activities into new markets, especially in Southeast Asia. The ultimate purpose of this, of course, is to sell more cars, and with labour so cheap in, say, Malaysia, Fernandes's homeland, is there a temptation to move Caterham production out of the UK?

"Absolutely not," insists Ali. "The whole infrastructure for building Caterhams is here in Britain, all our suppliers are based here. And the beauty of a Seven is that there's hardly any labour in it; there'd be comparatively little saving to be made."

For the moment, at least, Ali doesn't see Caterham expanding massively, despite the fresh investment opportunities brought by Team Lotus Enterprise. "Caterham is very profitable on 500 units (the company's sales last year), so with new markets 1000 cars annually seems like the right number on a global basis. We need to continue doing what we do, and doing it well."


Ali confesses that during six years at the helm of Caterham, the need to focus on running a business during some pretty tough times has meant he's felt like a caged animal, locked in his office. Now that Fernandes and crew have effectively opened the cage door, he's not quite sure in which direction to run. What he won't be doing, however, is indulging in a massive spending spree.

"I'm telling everyone in the factory that we will still be running a very tight ship. We've done well on nothing. And we're innovative when we've only got two brass farthings to rub together, so I feel we mustn't now get carried away."

Yet there is a need to move Caterham on, a process that has already started with the forthcoming SP/300.R sports racer-cum-trackday-special, development of which has slowed over the last few months while the Team Lotus deal was being negotiated. "When I first got here," reveals Ali, "I wrote a story in the Caterham club magazine and said 'please don't love us to death.'

"That created an instant furore. What I meant by it was that the company ultimately won't survive on enthusiastic support alone - we're a business and we need to make money. So as well as the Seven we do need to do other things. The SP/300.R was born out of requests from some customers to move on from the Seven.

"I'm very excited about this car because it proves that customers are prepared to accept a sibling for the Seven. There's been a lot of interest in the car from the States, and early development figures coming off it are surprising even Lola (the race outfit helping to engineer the SP/300.R)."

Does that mean Caterham might countenance a new road car, something akin to the S1 Elise, now that Lotus appears to be moving away from this area? "I'd be lying if I said we haven't thought about it," admits Ali, "but when you're looking at this type of vehicle, you're moving into the realms of Whole Vehicle Approval, which is massively expensive and complicated.

"It would also mean meeting legislative needs for airbags and stability control systems etc, all of which add weight and move us away from our traditional philosophy of lightness and affordability. So for now we'll stick to small series production."

Whether or not the words and thoughts of Messrs Ali and Fernandes bring you hope and solace or fail to assuage your cynicism, there's no doubting that Caterham will be in the news for many months to come.

bron: http://www.pistonheads.co.uk/doc.asp?c=52&i=23559

[Jeroenbox]

de woorden van Ansar Ali zijn wel wat waard. stel je een bedrijf voor dat 500 wagens maakt en die nergens meer op kenteken kan krijgen behalve in UK en voor de track. dat is een doodlopend pad. de Caterham is altijd als bouwpakket gebleven omdat op deze manier de wagens nog op de weg konden komen zonder dure crashtests en andere verplichte zaken.

wie ooit in de fabriek geweest is of een onderdeel wilde halen weet dat de kans dat daar op korte termijn een Elise achtige vandaan komt extreem klein is.

ik ben gek op mijn Caterham omdat het een enorme kick geeft (meer dan de RGB Exige) en dan vooral op het circuit. de openbare weg is eigenlijk geen plek voor de Caterham.

[electroshock]

Ansar Ali's reactie op blatchat:

Ansar Ali
Location: Dartford Posted - 28 April 2011 18:01

I think this is a good idea (it was suggested by a colleague) so below please find my speech guide notes to the press event of 27 April. I mean what I said...

Notes for Weds 27th April 2011.

Good morning ladies and gentlemen.

• Please accept my apologies up front for clichés and the like because personally and professionally this occasion is one that I could only contemplate in my wildest of dreams. Over the top you may think but I assure you it is not – the linking of forces of Caterham Cars with Team Lotus and Tony Fernandes is a natural and logical consequence and one that appeared so obvious to me
• I didn’t hesitate in making that call to Tony’s office to request a meeting and fortunately it was received with equal aplomb; very quickly it was obvious to me how much we had in common and I am not just talking about the fact that we probably played cricket against one another whilst at our respective high schools
• Since I led the MBI in January 2005 my focus, and that of my team has been on the Caterham Seven and getting a wider audience to appreciate what fun it is to drive and how pure is the Caterham experience
• We have been very successful in this quest despite commercial constraints and limitations - exports of the Seven have been growing especially in France, Italy and Japan, in 2008 our R500 was awarded BBC Top Gear TV CoTY and recently we launched the Caterham-Lola SP/300.R opening a new dimension to our business and thus stretching our horizons
• Caterham Cars is personal to me – although I took over the baton from Graham Nearn only 6 years ago the passion and soul of the place has seeped into my skin and has taken full residence; therefore my responsibility to Caterham employees, customers, partners and supporters is more than just business
• After I met Tony for the first time I knew – I just knew – and since then I have seen enough of how he operates to assure me that not only does the uniting of Caterham with Team Lotus feel right……. it is right
• He and his partners respect the fact that Caterham is a British automotive brand and acknowledged for its engineering excellence so we will continue to focus on the Seven and deliver the exciting SP/300.R but now we also have the opportunity to expand the Caterham family and our association with F1 will pump even more oxygen into the brand
• We command untainted respect and reputation amongst the automotive world delivering a unique benchmark in performance and handling and this will never be compromised. What is so exciting is the fact that my team and I now have the genuine opportunity to take the brand’s truly unique philosophy and spirit of pure driving thrills and enjoyment beyond our present borders
• Trying to put into context what this unique opportunity represents and why I am still in some state of shock is best exemplified by a posting I recently read on a blog site
".......what engine do you have in your Caterhams? Well my first Caterham had an engine derived from a Rover Metro but now it's based on an F1 T128 race car ...."
• Caterham’s history and that of the Seven is peppered with re-invention, innovation and evolution and today is just but the next chapter in this history book
• This will be an evolution not a revolution as we continue the responsible custodianship not only of the Seven, but of the Caterham brand
• Caterham grew out of the genius of Colin Chapman, and has since matured into a respected automotive brand delivering an unrivalled racecar for the road experience. We will remain true to this philosophy and spirit which we have protected and matured so successfully
• And I have seen several comments in recent days lamenting the fact that another British sports car company has fallen into foreign ownership. To this I’d like to make just a few observations:
o Firstly, Tony is probably more English than me. Not only that but when I asked him what drove him in his business ambitions he said there were two things; (i) working with people and helping them achieve their full potential and (ii) mixing business with pleasure
o Secondly, and joking apart, I don’t think I have met anybody as enthusiastic or as passionate about a business which he readily admits he has much to learn about. But lack of knowledge appears not to have held him back from other endeavours and this must bode well for Caterham
o And lastly, when I spoke at Donington in 2007 celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Caterham Seven I said I hoped that we would be celebrating another 50 years in 2057. I confess now that at the time I probably wasn’t that confident of Caterham seeing it through to 2057; now, and teaming up with Tony, I can confidently suggest to my colleagues and customers that they can look forward to a date in 2057 with confidence. We will be there – Caterham will be there and that’s all that matters.

http://blatchat.com/t.asp?id=202153&pn=12&ps=15