HERE Navigation helps prevent Lotus Emeya customers from running out of juice

The Lotus Emeya — the company’s first-ever four-door, fully-electric, hyper-GT — proves the British brand is at the forefront of high-performance design and automotive tech innovation.

Following last year’s successful integration of HERE Navigation into the Lotus Eletre hyper-SUV, HERE360 sat down with Serino Angellotti, Lotus’s Senior Chief Engineer, Electrics and Electronics Digital User Experience, to find out how the collaboration has been extended into the latest addition to their luxury performance EV line-up.

With HERE Navigation, Emeya's navigation experience can be updated over the air — why is this important for a Lotus driver?

“The onboard digital user experience and customers’ expectations of it are growing very fast. The ability to update a product over the air — to get new, useful and more exciting functionality — is strongly expected by our customers.

“This desire for new technology is a key trend in the EV segment, and being fast to deploy new content is crucial to maintain engagement with those who already own a Lotus and to convince those who would be considering buying a new one.

“For this reason, we have collaborated with HERE to create a funnel of functional improvement and new feature deployment that will be delivered over-the-air and will delight and increase the pleasure of driving a Lotus.”

Why did you choose to work with HERE?

“Many of today’s automotive navigation systems work using software on the customer’s smartphone, which has its limitations. HERE isn’t reliant on the smartphone — its technology is integrated into the car and future-proofed thanks to over-the-air updates.

“By developing a fully customized Lotus system with HERE, together we are pioneering in the auto-tech environment. And being pioneering, sophisticated and rebellious are at the heart of the Lotus brand.”

The Lotus Emeya is also enhanced by HERE EV Range Assistant and HERE EV Charge Points — how does this help to mitigate EV range anxiety?

“Lotus is the very first car brand in the world that has fully deployed the potential of HERE by including HERE EV Range Assistant and HERE EV Charge Points. With our combined engineering expertise, we have developed a predictive consumption model to highlight how Emeya’s powertrain will likely discharge based on the driver’s behavior. As a result, the projected range is incredibly accurate.

“To help our customers one step further, the driver can select a personalized range threshold — the so-called 'comfort zone’ — meaning that Emeya’s navigation system will plan a route so the battery charge never drops below 10%. And if you want to play it safer, this parameter can be adjusted to 20 and even 30%.”

Lotus has just ended its 75th anniversary by being awarded CarWow's Brand Of The Year — what can we expect in 2024 and beyond?

“In 2024, we have two key milestones. Now that the Lotus Emeya has been unveiled, we will start to deliver them in China in Q1, then across Europe and the UK later in the year. The second is continuing the global roll-out of the Lotus Eletre, which we’ll see on the road throughout North America, the Middle East, Japan and South Korea this year.”