Like the Eletre, the Emeya is clearly not your typical Lotus of old – not in appearance or in terms of gestation.
The design work took place in Coventry but the dynamic development team was based in Frankfurt and production happens in Wuhan. Hethel isn’t really involved at any stage, although Gavan Kershaw, Lotus’s lauded ‘vehicle attributes’ director and somebody who most certainly gets what makes a scintillating driver’s car, did make regular trips to hammer camouflaged mules around the Nürburgring. He essentially signed off the car’s blend of ride and handling.
Three versions will be offered: the basic Emeya, the S and the R. With 905bhp, a Ferrari 296 GTB-slaying 2.8sec 0-62mph time and a price of £137,000, the R will grab the headlines, but the S will take the bulk of sales.
Mind you, the S isn’t slow either. With 603bhp, it will rattle off the sprint to 62mph in 4.2sec. Between 100 and 150mph, it’s also just as pulverisingly quick an RS6 Avant, judging by an impromptu autobahn dalliance on the launch event. This is a bit of a Carlton moment – a little bittersweet, perhaps, and a surprise for the chap in the Audi.
Lotus engineers say the Emeya can maintain its top speed from 100% battery charge right down to 10%. It’s a bit of an irrelevant flex, but when you consider that EVs would typically begin to degrade their performance after 10 or 15 minutes at flat chat, it serves to highlight the resilience of this Geely-built powertrain.
All Emeyas use a new two-layer, 102kWh nickel-manganese-cobalt battery pack, good for a claimed 379 miles in the basic model and (mechanically identical) S and 270 miles in the R. It rests on the floor of the same Geely EPA platform used for the Eletre. However, because the cooling elements are here housed in a channel through the middle of the pack, the height of it is a useful 20mm lower.
Surprisingly, the GT also has a longer wheelbase than the SUV, by a good 60mm. That’s one reason for its remarkable rear leg room. More broadly, the Emeya is certainly a large car. In length and height, it splits the difference between the Taycan and EQS, but its width is closer to the latter’s. Step out of the EV sphere and the Porsche Panamera – a car that Lotus benchmarked for all-round usability – has a similar stature.
As for visual presence, the Emeya has an elegant silouette but quite abrupt surfacing and an insectoid look about it. The Kamm-style tail, intersected by a full-width light bar, is dramatic, no doubt.
