Vintage Aircraft Compass Mark Viii / Us Navy on 2040-parts.com

New Lotus Esprit cancelled? Not according to Lotus

The Interwebs are rife with rumours that the new Lotus Esprit has been cancelled. But Lotus say it’s not and the claims are made up. Dany Bahar was finally ousted from Lotus after the new owners of Lotus managed to remove the flamboyant former Ferrari man from his role at Lotus and ditch his fantasy plans to turn Lotus in to a cross between Aston Martin and Ferrari.

Frankfurt 2011:Rimac Concept One – an Electric Supercar

Rimac One Concept - an electric hypercar at Frankfurt Our antipathy towards electric cars – and the seeming futility of pursuing a technology that has made little progress in a century – is well known. But we do see electric cars as a fun toy for the better-off, and 23 year-old Croatian Mate Rimac has impressed Frankfurt with his Rimac Concept One electric supercar, which is perhaps the ultimate electric toy for the better-off. Perhaps, in the case of the Rimac One, we should consider it a toy for the seriously well-off, rather than just the better-off, as it’s expected to cost a quite substantial £650k for each of the 88 cars Mate intends making.

CAR interviews Mazda design chief Ikuo Maeda (2010)

By Tim Pollard Motor Industry 02 September 2010 13:30 CAR has been out to Italy to see the world premier of the new Mazda Shinari concept car. It's the car that ushers in chief designer Ikuo Maeda's new Kodo design mantra, a sharper, faster stylistic treatment that will take over from Laurens van den Acker's Nagare vision. Maeda is the first Japanese design boss for a generation – it seems that Mazda has looked within after a series of European creative brains who each stayed for five years or less, arguably not long enough to see through any substantial aesthetic change.