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It appears new Group Lotus CEO Jean-Marc Gales has a few cards up his sleeve for the Proton-owned British sports car manufacturer, as revealed in a recent interview with Top Gear Magazine UK.

First up, the former PSA head has proclaimed that "any car we launch in the next two years will be lighter and faster than its predecessor." The new Evora 400 is the fastest Lotus ever and is 22 kg lighter than before, setting the precedent for similar updates to the Elise and Exige – the latter also receiving the new 400 hp supercharged Toyota V6 – over the coming years. Additional track-biased Evora variants are also planned.

"They might lose some of the ride comfort they have now, though an Evora will still be comparable to a Porsche 911 in ride comfort," said Gales. "But the Evora 400 will gain massively on handling compared with now. I sleep very well at night knowing the engineers who sign-off the handling."

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But it won't be entirely about lightness – there's also an Evora roadster set to be launched within the next two years, and we've even heard rumours about a crossover version in the works! On the other end of the scale, a successor to the ultra-lightweight 2-Eleven is in the pipeline as well, again with 400 hp and weighing under 900 kg, and Gales promised that it will be "the fastest road car around the Nürburgring." A bold claim indeed.

Gales also said that the company has fixed the basic problems that have long dogged it, including opening dealerships in critical cities like Paris, Berlin, Monaco and Abu Dhabi, as well as implementing a customer database. It seems to be working – sales in the second half of the last financial year shot up by a massive 49% over the previous half to 1,114 units, its best six months since 2008/09.

Timing has also been improved since Gales arrived on scene – the new Elise S Cup was launched on time for the first time in the company's history, and the Evora 400 was completed ahead of schedule, something he said was unheard of. The latter will take 20% less time to build than the previous Evora; its parts also cost 10% less, and it will be built to a higher standard of quality.

Lotus Evora 400