Lotus unveils world’s first hyper-SUV EV, the Eletre

Lotus has unveiled the world’s first electric hyper-SUV, the Lotus Eletre. Lotus says it builds on the brand’s other models such as the Emira and its electric Evija hypercar to create the “hyper-SUV”. Lotus also counts on the Eletre to deliver a slew of firsts for the company.

It marks its first five-door production car, the first model outside sports car segments, and the first lifestyle EV for the brand. The Eletre is also an all-wheel drive with a battery capacity of over 100kWh.

The car is estimated to have more than 600hp, and its 0-100 sprint time is estimated to be under 3 seconds. For reference, the Porsche Cayenne Turbo GT has 640hp, the Aston Martin DBX 707 697hp, and both clock in at 3.3 seconds.

The Eletre is built on Lotus’ new Electric Premium Architecture (EPA) with a ‘low-to-ground’ design. This platform is also the basis for a range of new premium lifestyle electric vehicles from Lotus.

The company also comments that the Eletre is meant to be a “showcase for how a Lotus can deliver performance-oriented driving thrills and refinement outside of the traditional sports car segments”.

The Eletre comes packed with a slew of features from the Electric Reverse Mirror Display that’s replaced each door mirror, and a comprehensive suite of Intelligent Advanced Driver Assist Systems (ADAS). These include but aren’t limited to: Intelligent Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC), Lane Change Assist (LCA), and Children Presence Detection (CPD). The Eletre also has 5G compatibility.

The Eletre is now on sale across global markets, with first customer deliveries set to begin in 2023 across China, the UK, and Europe. No information is available yet on its availability in Singapore, although the Instagram page for Lotus Cars in Singapore have posted about the Eletre. But with the Emira in the $400k range here, we can expect the Eletre to be somewhere upwards of that.