Lotus was founded by Londoner Colin Chapman in 1952, and the company's factory Formula 1 teams won seven constructors championships and six driver titles between 1958 and 1994. Some of the best F1 drivers in history have driven for Lotus, including Mario Andretti, Emerson Fittipaldi, and Graham Hill. As for the company's off-track efforts, Lotus cars has been majority owned by Zhejiang Geely Holding Group since 2017. The Hangzhou, China-based corporation also owns the automotive brands Geely Auto,
Volvo Cars, ZEEKR, Polestar, and Cao Cao Mobility. The Zhejiang Geely Holding Group was ranked 185th in the Fortune Global 500 in 2024 and employs more than 140,000 people worldwide. In 2018, the year after it took control of Lotus, Zhejiang Geely Holding Group paid $9 billion to become the largest single shareholder of Mercedes-Benz parent company Daimler AG.
The current lineup of Lotus cars includes the Eletre, Emira, Emeya, and Evija. SlashGear's first look at the Lotus Eletre showed that the electric SUV has an eye on the future, our review of the Emira 2.0 Turbo revealed otherworldy handling, and spending time with the Lotus Evija demonstrated that it can literally eat through the wind. Lotus makes cars at a factory near company headquarters in Hethel, England and has a facility in Wuhan, China that is dedicated to electric vehicle (EV) production.
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Lotus Has Denied Rumors About Moving Production To The U. S.
The locations of the two major Lotus factories are tied to a corporate presence there; Lotus has been based in Hethel since 1966 and Geely has 22 factories in China. Outlets including the BBC have reported that Lotus is considering moving some production from Hethel to the United States, but Geely has denied this. The new trade deal between the U.S. and England reduced U.S. tariffs on British-made cars from 27% to 10%, taking away some of the incentive for this potential change.
Geely could move some Lotus production to its 2.3-million square foot Volvo factory in Ridgeville, South Carolina; U.S. production would help Lotus avoid even the 10% tariffs. A move to South Carolina would be a huge boost to the brand's EVs, which are produced in China and thus subject to 27.5% tariffs and questions about security and sustainability.
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