2008 Lotus Elise Sc on 2040-cars

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China's Geely says it has no plan to buy Fiat Chrysler — as FCA stock leaps

HONG KONG — Chinese carmaker Geely Automobile denied media speculation on Wednesday that it planned to make a takeover bid for Fiat Chryslerk Automobiles (FCA), the world's seventh-largest automaker. Geely was one of several Chinese carmakers cited in by Automotive News, which said representatives of "a well-known Chinese automaker" had made an offer this month for FCA, which has a market value of almost $20 billion. "We don't have such a plan at the moment," Geely executive director Gui Shengyue told reporters at an earnings briefing, when asked if Geely was interested in Fiat. He said a foreign acquisition would be complicated, but he did not elaborate. "But for other (Chinese) brands, it could be a fast track for their development," Gui added. However, a source close to the matter said FCA and Geely Automobile's parent firm, Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, had held initial talks late last year, without disclosing their nature. The source confirmed Geely was no longer interested in FCA, noting that the parent company had only three months ago announced its first push into Southeast Asia with the purchase of 49.9 percent of struggling Malaysian carmaker Proton, a deal that also included a stake in Lotus. Geel's denial failed to dent FCA's stock. The price of its Milan-based shares has jumped more than 10 percent to a 19-year high since Automotive News first reported on Monday, citing unnamed sources, that FCA had rejected the Chinese offer as too low. FCA stock on the New York Stock Exchange rose sharply on Monday from $11.60 to $12.38 and on Wednesday was trading at $12.84. FCA declined to comment on Wednesday. FCA Chief Executive Sergio Marchionne has repeatedly called for mergers as a way of sharing the costs of making cleaner, more advanced cars, but he has repeatedly failed to find a partner and retreated from his search for in April, saying FCA would stick to its business plan. He has also spoken of spinning the successful Jeep and Ram divisions off from FCA. Europe's largest carmaker, Volkswagen, and General Motors have both said they are not interested in talks with FCA. On Wednesday, Geely Automobile reported a doubling of first-half profit, above expectations, as cars designed with Sweden's Volvo won over domestic consumers. Volvo is a unit of the Zhejiang Geely group, and has recently announced it will share its technology with Geely.

Lotus bows out of Paris Motor Show

The plan put forth by former Lotus CEO Dany Bahar was to explode the British brand into the high-dollar sports car segment and directly challenge its marquee names. The first explosion came with the surprise introduction of five concepts at the 2010 Paris Motor Show. What has continued to surprise, though, is that the explosions haven't stopped: parent company Proton has had troubles leading to a reworking of its Formula One involvement, its IndyCar effort has had a rough ride, Proton's sale to Malaysian conglomerate DRB Hicom led to a production stoppage, and while the company was reassured that it wouldn't be sold, Bahar was shown the door - along with four of those Paris concepts, as far as we can tell. Yet the company is still making highly regarded cars and going racing.
So it shouldn't be all that surprising that, according to a report in Car and Driver, Lotus won't be attending this year's Paris Motor Show at all. Lotus didn't have much to show off at the Geneva Motor Show or the New York Show as all development was halted for two months, and the new corporate owner and new CEO installed by that owner are still working through the details of its niche English property. We will hope this is nothing more than a step in the reorganization, and look forward to seeing the Hethel firm again in Los Angeles or Detroit.

Lotus cars to be 'Made in China' at new Geely plant, according to documents

BEIJING/SHANGHAI — The Chinese owner of Lotus plans to start producing the British sports car brand in China for the first time with the opening of a new 9 billion yuan ($1.3 billion) factory in Wuhan city, company job advertisements and government documents showed. The previously unreported plans are Zhejiang Geely Holding Group's first move to shake up the British brand since its purchase of a majority stake in 2017. The move is in line with Geely's ambitions to build more up-market cars and throw off its reputation for copycat designs and shoddy quality. For Lotus, it could mean greater production volumes and new models such as SUVs to boost sales. "For Geely, going high-end can help it take more market share," said Alan Kang, Shanghai based analyst at LMC Automotive. "Geely needs to do that to better compete with global brands." Lotus cars are currently built in Norfolk, England. Geely and Lotus said in a joint statement that while Norfolk was Lotus's manufacturing home, a key part of the firm's strategy to revive the brand was expanding the brand's manufacturing footprint globally. "Details on additional locations and models will be confirmed in due course," the company said in an e-mail to Reuters. The planning authority of Hubei province, whose capital is Wuhan, last month approved Geely's plans for the plant. The factory will be able to manufacture 150,000 cars annually, according to a document posted on the authority's website. The Wuhan Development Zone, where the factory will be based, said in a statement posted on its website last month that production at the plant would include "Geely's Lotus project". The Wuhan Development Zone did not respond to Reuters' request for comment. The documents did not say when the plant would start operations. The facility is approved to build all-electric battery cars, electric hybrids as well as combustion engine cars like Lotuses. Job advertisements on Geely's website show the automaker is looking to fill at least 20 Wuhan-based roles for the Lotus project. LUXURY AMBITIONS While is not clear what portion of the new Chinese production line would be devoted to the British brand, greater production volumes would be consistent with Geely's stated ambition to grow the market for Lotus by broadening its line-up. Geely sold only 1,630 Lotuses globally in 2018. Lotus currently produces models such as the Evora and Elise.