Alarm bells rang in certain sectors of the supercar community when it was announced in April that McLaren Automotive had been acquired by Abu Dhabi–based investors who had a plan to expand into “new product categories.” That sounded a lot like an SUV, which other supercar makers, including Lamborghini and Ferrari, have done in recent years to increase revenue streams.
Maybe even an electric SUV, to which the British publication Top Gear simply said: “Please don’t.”
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In an interview at Monterey Car Week, McLaren CEO Nick Collins—who was appointed in April, succeeding Michael Leiters—neither confirmed nor denied the development of an SUV, electric or otherwise, but did say that there will be new “categories” of cars to come, “sooner, probably, than people suspect they will.”
Collins also said that changes with the new investors, and under his own leadership, are already being felt throughout the 39-year-old automaker, including with its upcoming W1.
“I like to think you’ll see the impacts of some of our decisions even as early as on W1,” Collins said. “You’re always trying to make cars better as you go towards production.”
Collins was brought in by the Abu Dhabi investors, who also led a recapitalization of the company, announcing several new board members in the process. Collins previously led Forseven, a startup, and before that had a variety of jobs at Jaguar Land Rover and Ford Europe.
Regarding his time at Forseven, Collins said, “We were working on things that have not been written about, speculated about, before you go into the electric SUV territory.” Forseven is now a part of McLaren, and some of those things will likely become McLaren projects.
“It’s not that we got our sketch pad out and decided what we are going to do,” added Collins, saying that they had been working on ideas for quite some time. “We pulled our board together six weeks ago . . . and showed them the future.”
Collins also said that the new regime is planning to invest in McLaren for the long term.
“We’re here for a very, very, very long time,” stated Collins.
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McLaren is poised to repeat as Formula 1’s Constructors’ Champion this year, with one of its drivers, either Oscar Piastri or Lando Norris, poised to win the Drivers’ Championship. Along with Collins, we also interviewed Henrik Wilhelmsmeyer, McLaren’s chief commercial officer, at the McLaren chateau in Monterey, where last year’s F1 car sat, in addition to the McLaren F1.
“Formula 1 has the ultimate reach,” said Wilhelmsmeyer. “Luxury brands go into Formula 1, so you see, definitely, a shift is happening.” As for the relationship Collins already has with the motorsport arm, the new CEO states, “I literally interact with [Zak Brown, McLaren Racing CEO] everyday.”
Wilhelmsmeyer calls McLaren Special Operations—the carmaker’s bespoke division—the “best-kept secret of the company.
“If you enter the world of MSO and understand the capabilities of what we have as a team and what it delivers, it opens, I would say, mouth-watering possibilities,” Wilhelmsmeyer said.
McLaren leaning more on customization would not be a surprise, given how much of an emphasis automakers have put on bespoke in recent years, but perhaps more surprising was Wilhelmsmeyer speaking of McLaren as a “luxury brand,” and not, say, a supercar brand.
“Some say a brand that has a more racing DNA, a more performance DNA, can’t be luxury, and I say, ‘Why not?'” Wilhemsmeyer said, adding that some brands do both. If Wilhemsmeyer was thinking of Ferrari, he didn’t say it, but he considers McLaren to be just as versatile. “I think we have all the rights to claim to be a luxury brand, but it comes with the behavior, comes with the attitude, and ultimately with the desirability with our brand and the product.”
The American market is more than half of McLaren’s current volume, according to Collins, and he thinks there is room for further expansion, especially given the ballooning popularity of Formula 1 in the U.S., and the success of the McLaren team at the moment. It wasn’t that long ago that Americans thought more of baby strollers than supercars or race cars when they heard the McLaren name.
Win on Sunday, sell cars on Monday, then?
“There’s certainly always an element of this,” Wilhelmsmeyer said. “But I think it’s so much more powerful than this. I’m always saying it’s the ocean of papaya that we are diving into . . . There’s so much positivity that comes with it, and what you ultimately want as a McLaren driver. If you show up at a red traffic light and you get the thumbs up.”
“Our opportunity in front of us is determined only by ourselves,” Collins said. “We don’t have to do any sort of quarterly sales call with investor analysts. We’ve made decisions that are right for the long-term of the business. They underpin residual value. They underpin how our customers feel about the investments they’ve made, about investing in the brand, about how our suppliers feel working with us as a business because we’re sober and stable in all those circles.”
An SUV, then, probably, and maybe even somewhere down the road an electric one. Even Ferrari did it, and the world didn’t end, though perhaps for some Ferrari enthusiasts it did. McLaren wants to build something for a lot longer than 39 years, and its fans will probably see the value in that, too.
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