Lotus to Hold 60th Birthday Party this Fall

Lotus is holding a birthday bash for over 15,000 of its closest friends this year, in celebration of 60 years spent executing founder Colin Chapman’s philosophy of “performance through lightweight.”

The diamond anniversary party will be held at the Lotus headquarters in Hethel, UK, on September 14, and will help to commemorate Chapman’s first ever car, the Lotus MK1. Lotus CEO Mike Kimberley calls the upcoming event “A great opportunity to celebrate the past and look forward to both a very special year for Lotus and a fantastic future.”

The storied automaker’s immediate future should be fairly exciting, as the company has plans to bring its Eagle concept to the London Motor Show this summer. That after launching a recent limited edition Exige to celebrate 40 years of production at Hethel.

(Click through the jump to read the official Lotus press release.)

Lotus has a history of holding fantastic public events and the 60th Birthday Party will follow this vein. Over 15,000 visitors are expected and will be a fun-filled day that all the family can enjoy. It was in 1948 that Colin Chapman built his first racecar. A pioneer, his breakthrough engineering firmly established him as one of the greatest automotive engineers of the 20th century. Chapman’s theory of “performance through lightweight” formed the foundation of one of the most successful racing teams to date and is imbedded in the Lotus philosophy.Group Lotus Plc CEO Mike Kimberley speaks passionately about celebrating Lotus milestone, “This is a great opportunity to celebrate the past and look forward to both a very special year for Lotus and a fantastic future. It’s important to us to celebrate the spirit of Lotus and we invite everyone to our headquarters to meet our people, our staff and our fans, and see us moving forwards. In 2008 an all new car will be unveiled at the London Motorshow and an impressive global expansion programme is planned for our high tech Lotus Engineering Consultancy, so there’s an exciting energy at Lotus that we want to share with our wider communities.”

An invitation is extended to all to join Lotus on 14th September 2008 for a day’s celebrations and with it the chance to experience the majesty of the marque and be part of Lotus’ tomorrow.

Lotus Cars

About Group Lotus plc:
The main operating subsidiary of Group Lotus plc is Lotus Cars Ltd, which has two operating divisions – Lotus Engineering and
Lotus Cars. Lotus Engineering is an internationally recognised automotive engineering consultancy based in Norfolk, UK. Its
global facilities include those in Michigan, USA and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and offices in Germany and China. Lotus
Engineering provides comprehensive and versatile consultancy services to many of the world’s OEMs and Tier 1 suppliers,
offering a full engineering service from initial concept and project design through development and integration of the complete
vehicle to meet all worldwide markets and customers to full production. This includes third party ‘niche vehicle’ engineering and
manufacture worldwide. Lotus Cars builds and sells Lotus sports cars, Elise, Exige and Europa for global sale.