Lotus’s electric future looks more concrete after the company has announced that it has won UK government support and funding to develop an all-new next-generation Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV) architecture.
The funding is awarded as part of the APC’s Advanced Route to Market Demonstrator (ARMD) competition. Funded by the UK Government’s Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), the competition is delivered on behalf of the APC by Cenex, the UK’s Low Carbon and Fuel Cells Centre of Excellence.
The project that propelled Lotus to win the government support is called LEVA, which stands for Lightweight Electric Vehicle Architecture. The goal of the company is to create lightweight structures for next-generation BEVs with the Incorporation of cutting-edge UK-based engineering and digital manufacturing expertise.
The choice of this project does not come as a surprise as Lotus cars are known to be light and extra-agile. That is why the company must create lightweight structures in order to be successful in the EV world.
The weight issue is a key aspect for Lotus. We previously reported how the English company has decided that it won’t build any hybrid cars due to weight distribution problems. They want “to minimise weight and maximise performance and spread weight in the right places to get the right dynamics”.
Lotus is already in the process of producing its first ever EV, the Evija. It will be a very exciting ride as it boasts an incredible 1972 horsepower and it can go from 0 to 60 in less than 3 seconds with a top speed of 250 mph. The car is supposed to hit the road next year and cost £1.7 million.
However, for this project Lotus will collaborate with supply chain partner Sarginsons Industries and leading academics from Brunel University London to harness the full ‘light-weighting’ potential of the vehicle architecture. According to Matt Windle, Executive Director of Engineering, the all-electric future of the company is closer than we might think.
“Following the launch of the Lotus Evija, our all-electric hypercar, this project is a key building block in our vision to deliver a full range of electrified Lotus performance cars”, he said. “Funding of this nature is critical to stimulate the automotive industry and supply chain as both continue to adjust to a rapidly changing landscape.”