Great result and good to see the Lotus name on the podium again but did anyone else notice that the Lotus/Renault team was referred to by Varsha and Hobbs as "Renault" with nary a word of Lotus throughout the entire program. I listened fairly carefully and don't think I'm mistaken. Steve Matchett referred to the team as Renault/Lotus once (on lap 57.) I wonder what Mr. Bahar thinks of that. I'm a fan of David Hobbs and think it is way cool that he is a voiceover character in the new Cars film (he is David Hobbcap, a BRG Jag XKE.) which was announced after the completion of the race.
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dwkoski
Australian GP and Renault...errr ...Lotus/Renault
Yes this is rather confusing to say the least. But there are a number of articles that explain what is going on. It stems from the past where Chapman kept his car company separate from his racing company, giving us now what is known as Group Lotus (cars) and Team Lotus (racing).
Tony Fernandez, the Lotus Racing boss, secured the rights to use the original Racing team name "Team Lotus" for his F1 team from David Hunt the owner of the racing brand name. However,Danny Bahar and Group Lotus (cars) have come on the scene and things got complicated. Here's a good article about the history from the TopGear site. F1 2011: It?s Lotus vs Lotus - BBC Top Gear
Renault sold off the majority of their shares in the team to Genii Capital who are a Luxembourg based investment group. Genii and Group Lotus have partnered up to form "Lotus Renault GP" with Group Lotus taking a major stake in the team. News - Group Lotus + Renault + Genii = Lotus Renault GP
There has been quite a bit of legal ongoings regarding the Lotus name as Group Lotus (Proton the parent company and the owners of Group Lotus and the brand) attempted to prevent Fernandez from using the Lotus name.
I am not sure where this stands at the moment but it could be the reason why the media are not referring to the team as Lotus Renault GP at this time and Group Lotus are appearing to be just a main team sponsor. As you can see by the badge branding the two teams differentiate themselves by the original Lotus and the Lotus Racing badges.
Regardless, who cares? Let the suits sort all of that out as they like to do. It's just great to be a Lotus owner and fan right now and see both brands in F1. Also keep an eye on the Indy circuit and the GP2 and GP3 series as well as the GT2. There is a lot going on right now in the racing world for *Lotus*.
Tony Fernandez, the Lotus Racing boss, secured the rights to use the original Racing team name "Team Lotus" for his F1 team from David Hunt the owner of the racing brand name. However,Danny Bahar and Group Lotus (cars) have come on the scene and things got complicated. Here's a good article about the history from the TopGear site. F1 2011: It?s Lotus vs Lotus - BBC Top Gear
Renault sold off the majority of their shares in the team to Genii Capital who are a Luxembourg based investment group. Genii and Group Lotus have partnered up to form "Lotus Renault GP" with Group Lotus taking a major stake in the team. News - Group Lotus + Renault + Genii = Lotus Renault GP
There has been quite a bit of legal ongoings regarding the Lotus name as Group Lotus (Proton the parent company and the owners of Group Lotus and the brand) attempted to prevent Fernandez from using the Lotus name.
I am not sure where this stands at the moment but it could be the reason why the media are not referring to the team as Lotus Renault GP at this time and Group Lotus are appearing to be just a main team sponsor. As you can see by the badge branding the two teams differentiate themselves by the original Lotus and the Lotus Racing badges.
Regardless, who cares? Let the suits sort all of that out as they like to do. It's just great to be a Lotus owner and fan right now and see both brands in F1. Also keep an eye on the Indy circuit and the GP2 and GP3 series as well as the GT2. There is a lot going on right now in the racing world for *Lotus*.
This explains a lot.
I was wondering the same thing when here in Germany all I heard was the mentioning of Renault on TV this morning.
Not a single word of Lotus.
awesome race! and yes I noticed them say only Renault everytime except when the race was over and they went down the leaderboards. Pretty funny when they would say it and then pan to the pits with the crew wearing large LOTUS RENAULT suits. 
I hope that Mr.Bahar feels that he received his 24 million pounds worth when he was getting tons of branding exposure from Tony Fernandes for FREE!!! Regardless, the silly legal rangling continues and as someone once said, "there's no such thing as bad publicity." Ask Charlie Sheen. I was surprised that little mention was made of the two teams and I wonder if Bernie and the FIA or Speed's legal department have weighed in on that. I know that Hobbs is a big Lotus fan (and a Hami fanboy.)
Has anyone noticed how Infiniti sponsors Redbull Racing now? No one's going to call Redbull Infinity. I don't think the new Renault team will be called Lotus any time soon..
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