Caterham turns 50 this year and though it hasn’t marked the occasion by leaving its wife and kids for the company secretary, it has gone and got itself a shiny new sports car.
The firm that made a name for itself with the Seven, a minimalist two-seater designed by Lotus boss Colin Chapman in the 1950s, is jumping into the modern age with a new closed-wheel, electric car, and it’s bringing it to the Goodwood Festival of Speed this July. But Caterham will first reveal the car on July 12, the day before Goodwood kicks off, and today released a second teaser to give us a clue as to what we might expect when it switches the lights on in three weeks’ time.
A previous teaser image showed the outline of an elegant, curvy mid-engined sports car that looked more than a little reminiscent of a classic Ferrari 246 Dino. This time, it’s the front end that’s on display, though again, the car is in near darkness so it’s hard to make out much in the way of details.
Related: Caterham Teases Electric Project V Concept Ahead Of July 12 Debut
What we can see is a voluptuous one-piece hood with pronounced fenders and two slim DRLs mounted above what looks like a traditional air intake. But since we know this car is an EV, there won’t be any radiators requiring cool air so the front-end design should be relatively clean.
Caterham admits that the new car, which was created by the company’s new styling chief Anthony Jannarelly, will showcase a completely new design language that will be a radical departure from the company’s Seven line. But it says it remains committed to its core values of lightness, simplicity, and a driver-focused experience.
The firm has revealed that the show car has been built in Turin, Italy, by Italdesign, but doesn’t give any details about what materials it’s built from or what powertrain we can expect to see. Perhaps there’s a clue in another car Caterham is bringing to Goodwood. The EV Seven looks like a traditional Caterham and only weighs 70 kg (154 pounds) more, but it features a rear-mounted electric motor producing 240 hp (178 kW / 243 PS) and 184 lb-ft (250 Nm) of torque.
This isn’t the first time Caterham has tried to move on from the Seven. It launched the 21 to coincide with the company’s 21st anniversary in 1994, but sales were slow and the firm soon returned its focus to its most famous product.
