The Lotus Evija is off to a great start, recording double-digit bookings with most of the early allocations snapped up by customers in the United States. Lotus said all-new electric hypercar, which recently made its public debut at the Monterey Car Week at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, received plaudits from many distinguished individuals, including Jay Leno.

Company CEO Phil Popham said: “This is exactly the start we hoped for. Evija is an outstanding and exceptional car – designed and engineered to put Lotus back on the map as the innovator and technical leader that it is. Many orders are now taken, giving us great confidence to hit our planned volume as we enter production next year.”

Dubbed as the technical tour de force, the Lotus Evija – pronounced ‘E-vi-ya’ – is powered by four extremely compact single-speed, helical gear ground planetary gearboxes that measure 100 mm in depth. Each gearbox comes packaged with the e-motor and inverter as a single cylindrical Electrical Drive Unit, with Lotus targeting an output of 500 PS per e-motor.

A simple math puts the total system output at 2,000 PS, while torque is said to be around 1,700 Nm. With that, the Evija is said to be the world’s most powerful production road car, with a 0-100 km/h sprint time achieved in under three seconds, 100-200 km/h in less than three seconds, and 200-300 km/h in less than four seconds. In fact, Lotus says it takes less than nine seconds for the Evija to reach 300 km/h, which is better than any other direct competitor.

A 2,000 kW (70 kWh) lithium-ion battery resides in the middle of the lightweight carbon-fibre monocoque tub (129 kg), offering significant advantages in terms of styling, aerodynamics, packaging, weight distribution, occupant comfort and dynamic handling. The battery is the lightest, most energy dense, electric power package ever fitted to a road car.

The Evija is also gunning for a record lap time at the Nurburgring Nordschleife

Speaking of which, the battery offers a zero-emissions driving range of 400 km (based on WLTP cycle), and can be charged via an 800 kW ultra-fast charging system. When plugged in to said charger (the CCS Type 2 charging socket is hidden behind a vented flap at the rear of the car), it takes just nine minutes to fully recharge the battery.

The Lotus Evija, also known as the Type 130, is the company’s first completely new car (and first Lotus hypercar) to be launched under the stewardship of Geely, and production is limited to 130 examples globally. All units can be further personalised, and each of them will be hand-built in Hethel, with prices starting from £1.7 million (RM8.7 million). Interested parties will have to fork out a deposit of £250,000 (RM1.28 million) to secure a production slot.

-paultan