Lynn Calder - CEO of INEOS Autotmotive

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Smoking Tire – Episode with Lynn Calder, CEO of INEOS Automotive

Introduction to Guests

In this engaging episode of The Smoking Tire, hosts Matt Farah and Zack Klapman welcome Lynn Calder, the CEO of INEOS Automotive. Calder joins the conversation from the LA Auto Show, bringing insights into INEOS's unique approach to automotive design and manufacturing. The episode delves deep into the history of INEOS Automotive, the development of their flagship vehicle—the Grenadier—and the challenges and triumphs of building a brand from scratch in today's competitive automotive landscape.

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INEOS Automotive: Origins and Vision

Calder provides an overview of INEOS Automotive’s inception, highlighting the company's founder, Sir Jim Ratcliffe, one of the UK's wealthiest individuals. Ratcliffe's passion for robust, adventure-ready vehicles inspired the creation of INEOS Automotive.

[02:36] Lynn Calder: "The idea came about by our owner, Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who is at his heart an adventurer. He loves his cars, specifically his four-by-fours."

Calder explains that the initial concept emerged from Ratcliffe's frustration with the lack of durable, vintage-style SUVs available in the market, especially for demanding environments like Africa.

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Design Philosophy of the Grenadier

The Grenadier is INEOS Automotive’s answer to the modern SUV market saturated with overly stylized, technology-laden vehicles. Calder emphasizes the company’s commitment to creating a boxy, retro-inspired 4x4 that prioritizes functionality and off-road capability.

[04:40] Lynn Calder: "It's a boxy shape with a wheel at each corner to maximize the space, to maximize the visibility. It's about making a really good off-roader."

The design intentionally diverges from contemporary "eggy" crossovers, focusing instead on mechanical robustness and ease of use, appealing to enthusiasts who value tactile controls over digital interfaces.

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Supply Chain Challenges in Automotive Manufacturing

Calder candidly discusses the significant hurdles INEOS faced in sourcing parts amidst global supply chain disruptions.

[17:10] Lynn Calder: "Finding all the parts in the sufficient number that we need became a really big supply chain problem at a time when supply chain was really challenging for everyone."

Despite these obstacles, INEOS overcame them by leveraging strong relationships and strategic planning, allowing the company to maintain its production timeline and quality standards.

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Market Positioning and Competition with Land Rover

A key theme of the discussion revolves around why INEOS Automotive ventured into the rugged SUV market traditionally dominated by Land Rover. Calder believes that Land Rover’s move towards more subdued, technology-heavy vehicles left a niche market underserved.

[05:49] Lynn Calder: "There's a really strong market for a really nice, rugged looking SUV that's going to not ever do anything particularly challenging. But there's also a big market for people that need a utilitarian car or want to have fun in it."

INEOS positions the Grenadier as a direct competitor to Land Rover Defender, focusing on authenticity and off-road prowess rather than luxury and automation.

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Brand Awareness and Marketing Strategies

Calder addresses the challenge of building brand awareness for INEOS Automotive, a company primarily known for its ventures in the chemical and energy sectors.

[20:18] Lynn Calder: "INES has been around a long time, but no one knows who they are either."

To bridge this gap, INEOS leverages its extensive involvement in sports, such as Formula One and cycling, to enhance brand recognition and credibility in the automotive market.

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Interior Design: Analog vs. Digital Interfaces

A significant part of the conversation centers on INEOS Automotive’s decision to minimize digital interfaces in favor of traditional analog controls. Calder argues that tactile buttons and knobs enhance the driving experience by allowing drivers to remain focused and reduce distractions.

[08:27] Lynn Calder: "The number of buttons that controlled stuff in the interior was great because... you really get in there and feel like you're gonna take off."

This design choice contrasts sharply with the trend towards large touchscreens and deep menu systems, positioning the Grenadier as a vehicle for purists who prioritize driving engagement over technological conveniences.

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Customization and Personalization in INEOS Vehicles

Calder highlights INEOS's commitment to customization through their bespoke personalization brand, Arcane Works. This initiative allows customers to tailor their vehicles extensively, from color choices to trim options, enhancing the vehicle's uniqueness and personal appeal.

[31:25] Lynn Calder: "It's a vehicle that really lends itself to customization, and we're just getting started on that."

Such offerings align with the luxury market's demand for personalized vehicles, providing an additional layer of appeal to discerning customers.

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Future Models and Market Expansion

Looking ahead, INEOS Automotive plans to expand its lineup with models like the Quartermaster pickup truck and potentially a two-door variant to cater to different market segments. Calder hints at exploring higher-performance models and ensuring that future vehicles maintain the brand’s core values of ruggedness and reliability.

[44:32] Lynn Calder: "It would look very good as a two-door. We're definitely looking at a shorter wheelbase for sure."

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Perspectives on Electric Vehicles and Industry Trends

Calder expresses a measured skepticism towards the current push for electric vehicles (EVs), citing concerns over infrastructure, range anxiety, and regulatory mandates that may not align with consumer readiness.

[47:08] Lynn Calder: "If governments mandate it and people don't buy it, all they're going to do is keep their older, dirtier cars for longer and actually the whole thing fails."

Instead, INEOS supports hybrid solutions like range extenders as transitional technologies, believing they offer a balanced approach to reducing emissions while maintaining the functionality and reliability of traditional combustion engines.

[50:54] Lynn Calder: "Range extenders take away 80% of the emissions and all of the range anxiety."

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Q&A Highlights from Patrons

The episode features a lively Q&A session where patrons pose questions ranging from daily usability of the Grenadier to future performance models.

• Tim A: "Do you think the typical INEOS customer uses it as a daily driver?"

  [40:45] Lynn Calder: "Many choose it every day because of the unique driving experience it offers."

• Squirkle: "Plans to make an AMG or M competitor performance model?"

  [54:45] Lynn Calder: "We did a prototype with a V8 engine as a fun project and are open to similar ventures in small series production."

• Terry King: "Hope the Grenadier will gain the same following as Land Rover. Any thoughts?"

  [53:18] Lynn Calder: "We aim for the Grenadier to become an enduring icon, much like Land Rover, with vehicles that remain on the road for decades."

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Conclusion and Final Thoughts

The episode concludes with a mutual appreciation between the hosts and Calder, highlighting the promising future of INEOS Automotive in carving out a distinctive niche in the SUV market. Calder's passion for robust, driver-focused vehicles shines through, emphasizing INEOS's dedication to quality, functionality, and the pure joy of driving.

[59:02] Matt Farah: "Thank you to our patrons. Have a happy Thanksgiving... Lynn, it's been a real pleasure."

INEOS Automotive, under Calder’s leadership, continues to challenge industry norms by prioritizing durability, simplicity, and driver engagement, setting the Grenadier apart in a market increasingly dominated by technology-centric vehicles.

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Notable Quotes

• Lynn Calder: "It's a boxy shape with a wheel at each corner to maximize the space, to maximize the visibility." [04:40]

• Lynn Calder: "Building a super capable, super reliable, cool looking car had to pass emissions, pedestrian protection and be a modern vehicle." [26:48]

• Lynn Calder: "There's a bit of antidote to the millions of screens, but there's also an ease of use." [34:42]

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Key Takeaways

• INEOS Automotive is dedicated to creating robust, vintage-inspired SUVs that prioritize functionality over modern digital interfaces.
• The Grenadier stands as a testament to the company's commitment to authenticity, challenging the prevailing trends in the SUV market.
• Supply chain management remains a significant hurdle, but strategic planning has enabled INEOS to navigate these challenges effectively.
• Building brand awareness is crucial for INEOS, leveraging associations with sports and strategic acquisitions to enhance visibility.
• INEOS advocates for hybrid technologies as transitional solutions towards a more sustainable automotive future, expressing reservations about the current EV push.

For automotive enthusiasts and industry watchers, this episode offers a comprehensive look into how INEOS Automotive is shaping its path in the competitive SUV market, blending rugged tradition with modern engineering.

Transcript

[Matt Farah]

All right, folks, on this episode, we have a real treat on our hands. We are joined by the CEO of Ineos Automotive, Ms. Lynn Colter, who is in town for the LA Auto Show. If you haven't seen the INEOS Grenadier or their new Quartermaster range, it is a new car company that is making vintage style sort of throwback SUVs that people who have driven them can't seem to say enough nice things about. So we're going to learn about the history INEOS and what it's like to develop a brand new car completely from scratch. Not to mention what it's like to build a car that looks very old in a world where that seems to be not a thing that people can do. This is a very interesting hour of radio and we're very fortunate to have her. Lynn Calder, CEO of ENEOS Automotive, is on the Smoking Tire podcast.

[Lynn Calder]

You're. You've. You've got a lot of.

[Matt Farah]

We have fans.

[Lynn Calder]

You have fans.

[Zach Klapman]

Oh, cool.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, where are these people? Why aren't they Talk uk?

[Zach Klapman]

We had an audience.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, is it in the uk?

[Lynn Calder]

This was in the us.

[Matt Farah]

Okay, cool. We have some UK people.

[Lynn Calder]

I'm sure you do.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. We did a show at Caffeine and Machine in the UK and it was.

[Lynn Calder]

You know, that place I haven't been.

[Matt Farah]

You should go. You should do an event there.

[Lynn Calder]

Oh, yeah, that sounds good.

[Matt Farah]

It's like a permanent cars and coffee place. Yeah, Yeah. I think they have three of them now. Maybe three or four.

[Zach Klapman]

Three.

[Matt Farah]

That's great. Are we good? We're good, we're good. Welcome. Welcome to the west side. We tore you away from the convention center and here you are.

[Lynn Calder]

I'm delighted to be torn away.

[Zach Klapman]

Fantastic to hear all day.

[Matt Farah]

LA Auto Show. How's it shaping up?

[Lynn Calder]

It's been a great day. It's my first LA auto show actually. So it's been a great day for me.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. It's a press day, right? Is it a press day? I think it is. My friend, I can. Oh, my phone's in the office. But my friend just came back from the auto show and literally said the only worth thing worth seeing was the INEOS stand.

[Lynn Calder]

Yes.

[Matt Farah]

So I love that. Yeah. And he's a hydrogen guy. So he said. He said if you want to talk about hydrogen, this is your guy. Hydrogen Brian is my neighbor, but he said you had the only good stand there, so nicely done.

[Lynn Calder]

Thanks.

[Matt Farah]

Hydrogen Brian, you've impressed this one. Angeleno. So this is like INEOS is a. Is an Interesting car company and where did it come from?

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, it looks pretty random, right?

[Matt Farah]

It is random but also it's sort of also obvious as the counterbalance to cars being shaped like eggs for 10 years, right?

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. And only getting more so and only getting more laden with tech and only getting more softer and not really what there for what they were intended to do in the first place. So I mean the idea came about by our owner, Sir Jim Ratcliffe, who is one of the UK's richest men. He is completely self made. He's built a big conglomerate of petrochemicals, chemicals and oil and gas energy. But he is at his heart an adventurer. He loves his cars. He specifically loves his four by fours and so else. It started off as a bit of a passion of oh, do you know, you know they're not making anything like this anymore. Which means it's going to be difficult for me to go from coast to coast in Africa and not break down and be able to fix it and get on my way again. He also then just, he's a businessman, right. He was like, there's a gap, there's a gap in the market. He doesn't like that. Everything looks bulbous and like an egg.

[Matt Farah]

I read that he literally tried to buy the IP and tooling for the Defender from Land Rover, is that correct?

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, there were some early discussions where he kind of thought actually well if you don't want to do it, I'll do it. Because the reasons given were it's modern emissions, modern pedestrian protection, all the illegals that we have to abide by. And I think we just thought we wanted a crack at doing it and we just then thought okay well we'll just do it ourselves.

[Matt Farah]

Well it's pretty ambitious to not just okay go, we're gonna do resto mods and we're gonna find VINs and we're gonna build pretty much new cars. But they're really, they're old, 67 Series 2 or whatever. But you go, we're gonna at first glance looks like a Land Rover Defender. When you put them side by side there's clear differences. But first glance that's what it's kind of generally going to look like. But it is a new car that exists in a new world. That's like really hard right from the ground up. Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

So it's designing it so it might at first glance look like that. But actually what really drove that was more it's a boxy shape with a wheel at each corner to maximize the space, to maximize the visibility. It's like, how do you make a really good off roader? It's that shape, it's that sort of dimension, it's the ground clearance, that's the approach and departure angles. So that kind of drove the design. But then it's hard. Yeah. Then you got to engineer it and then you got to work out how you're going to build it. And then you've got to build a supply chain. We've got 2,400 parts in this thing.

[Matt Farah]

One of which may have been a little more problem than recently. Right?

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. No cars without seats.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, we'll get to that. But it's. I mean, if land. Why do you think Land Rover themselves didn't think. I mean, obviously there is a car out called Defender that has vague cues that resemble the original one, but it's clearly in reality nothing like the original one. Your car is much closer than what Land Rover is selling now to that original spirit. Why do you think they couldn't do it or didn't want to do it?

[Lynn Calder]

I think probably the same reason that most of the others are doing it. There's a really strong market for a really nice, rugged looking SUV that's going to not ever do anything particularly challenging. People want big cars, they want to sit high up, they want to feel safe, they look cool. It's a big segment. And I think that the segment is going in that sort of direction of sedating itself because there's a big market for it. But there's also a really big market for people that either need to have a utilitarian car or want to, because they have a lot of fun in it and they do lots of cool stuff. And that was the segment that was being left behind that we kind of wanted to go and say, hey, we'll fill it, we'll do it.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach Klapman]

Is this a situation where the majority of the market is heading towards egg crossover things and for a factory to keep essentially two lines open to build this small niche thing for Land Rover to do that, it's just too expensive and they cut costs, I think.

[Lynn Calder]

I mean, I can't. I don't know about them. I would say. I love your eggy crossover, by the way. That's great. And I think that platform sharing, you know, sort of investing in one super expensive platform and then getting as many vehicles as you possibly can from it is definitely driving economics and driving eggy looks from a design perspective because you can vary a huge amount about what you do. Once you've got the platform, you've got to have a certain, you know, you've got to have a certain seat reference position. Yeah. And you've got to have a certain, you know, windscreen angle. And that means that it's just driving everything to look the same. But it was another thing we were railing against is we don't want to look the same. So whilst it looks like we're trying to do something that has been done before, it's not being done now. And what we're really trying to do was just build a retro looking 4x4 that can go anywhere you want it to go.

[Matt Farah]

What I liked about it, we saw the ones at the Goodwood Festival of Speed 2022. They were early, early, early. And I went, oh, I don't know. But one in la, much later, a customer car. And I went, oh, this is actually, this is like put together really nice. It was really impressive. But I got in it and I really was like, there were so many buttons and levers and I was like, oh, this is great. Because we're, I think we have too much screen in our lives and for some things in a car, like a screen really is the right answer. But for less. I think it's for less things than you think, you know. And so the number of the amount of buttons that controlled stuff in the interior, I was like, yes. I was so excited.

[Lynn Calder]

The whole screen thing, I mean, I think, you know, look at that panel.

[Matt Farah]

Sorry to interrupt. It looks like it looks like a, like a 747's panel.

[Lynn Calder]

It does. And look, the feedback we get on that. And it's one of my favorite things as well. Like you really, you really get in there and feel like you're gonna take off.

[Matt Farah]

Ceiling toggles are what's up all day. All the ceiling toggles, please.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, no, we absolutely love this. But you're so right about screens. I mean you sure they have their place, lots of people like them. But I don't know, I mean, I think it's disappeared up its own ass in a way as well, you know, I mean actually on some occasions, true story. You need to go through four different menus to open the glove box.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

And that just becomes stupid, pointless.

[Matt Farah]

It's really bad. You know where it's really bad when they put the ADAS stuff a couple menus deep and we drive like, you know, the European reg cars now where, where it's mandatory on and like I have to go so many menus to turn that stuff.

[Lynn Calder]

We're fixing that one click ADAS disable button.

[Matt Farah]

Is that Possible.

[Lynn Calder]

Well, we're just going to disable the whole thing because we don't need to do it here.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, in America.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. Yeah. So we can't disable it in Europe, but we can disable it here. So, yeah, we're going to switch it off at software level so you don't have to deal with it at all. I did actually insist, and this is not just for the US market, this is for me because I drive a Grandiere that we factory program the ADAS functions into the Favorites button.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

So at least you can start so.

[Matt Farah]

You can quick click off. Yeah, that's like, that's kind of the move. Like, it's fine if they have to be on. I get it. But like, how about a one button, go away kind of thing, you know?

[Lynn Calder]

But look, I mean, we've taken a lot of flack on that and I completely get it. And actually driving in Europe, where we have to have it, it really drives me insane as well. It's awful. And I hate the way that regulation is taking us sometimes because it just, you know, we're all about bringing the joy, the fun back into driving. And actually it's not very fun when you're getting told every five minutes that you're doing something wrong. But yeah, we're a startup, we're in 50 countries and we're trying to get them all Grenadiers into all of them in a legal way. And it's complex.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, dude, I'm not complaining about this feature as a. I've not driven a Grenadier yet. You understand this, right? I'm getting one in two weeks. But I couldn't comment on your car, how it drives because I, I haven't driven one yet. But like, we've driven like, for instance, all the new Aston Martins, which is like that. And I don't mean to single out Aston Martin, but as it just so happens, they did this pretty egregiously. They buried in the menu in their beautiful new touchscreen, how to turn off the ADAS stuff. And we were driving European spec press cars. And every time. This might be a journalist problem, but you're filming it. You're turning the car off and on like 100 times. You have to keep going in and doing it. And so it's not you even that. If it's gotta be mandatory, fine. But like, just give me a one button, go away solution.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. Who wants to be European these days, right?

[Matt Farah]

Hey, listen, you guys do a lot of things, all right?

[Lynn Calder]

And a lot of things we don't I mean. Yeah, back to.

[Matt Farah]

I mean, listen.

[Lynn Calder]

Disappearing up our own asses again.

[Matt Farah]

Welcome to America where we're perfect. Didn't you know? Didn't you know, like, we never make any mistakes here.

[Zach Klapman]

Perfect places in the middle of the Atlantic. In between both.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, Iceland. Exactly.

[Lynn Calder]

Iceland.

[Matt Farah]

Iceland's great. Yeah, Iceland is good. You guys probably have a big market. Are you in Iceland?

[Lynn Calder]

We are in Iceland, yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Has Arctic Trucks approached you guys yet to do the crazy one?

[Lynn Calder]

No, because we've actually got. We've got Einar in Iceland. Who's our guy? Who does crazy.

[Matt Farah]

You have your own guy.

[Lynn Calder]

He does some crazy stuff. He's put 44 wheels.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, can you please Google Eneos? Iceland or whatever. Let's get some pictures of that. I love Iceland trucks. They're so cool.

[Lynn Calder]

Let me see if I can sort of talk and he can.

[Matt Farah]

Zack, do it so the audience can see it.

[Lynn Calder]

Well, even better. But the. We actually also look.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, yeah. That looks excellent.

[Lynn Calder]

There we go.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, There. That looks that. It actually looks. Oh, it looks great.

[Lynn Calder]

I mean, it is very cool.

[Matt Farah]

That looks so good.

[Zach Klapman]

The proportions work really well.

[Matt Farah]

Wow. It's amazing how well the proportions hold up to those tires. Wow. Iceland does it. They are.

[Lynn Calder]

Iceland knows what's going on. We should all move to Iceland. Back to your point of summer. In the summer, though, I have been great. Yeah. It's fabulous.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Although you're from Scotland, so you get. It's pretty close.

[Lynn Calder]

Just. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I was there in summer this year, and it was. And I'm sorry, I'm not going to be in Fahrenheit here, but it was 4 degrees C, which is really cold. Which is cold in summer.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

And that was very much reminded me.

[Matt Farah]

Of that cold and like daylight, 24 hours a day is extremely strange.

[Lynn Calder]

That was reminding me sort of July. 4 degrees C reminds me very much of home.

[Zach Klapman]

That's pretty cold, for sure.

[Matt Farah]

That's cold. Yeah. Still pretty.

[Lynn Calder]

Oh, it's gorgeous.

[Zach Klapman]

We were there in July and it was 39 degrees.

[Matt Farah]

No, it was warm. Yeah, it was nice.

[Lynn Calder]

I think the week after I was there, it felt really nice again. So. Yeah, but. No, it's very cool.

[Matt Farah]

But did you get to drive that?

[Lynn Calder]

I did not get to drive that.

[Matt Farah]

Since CEO privileges dictate.

[Lynn Calder]

We. We've also just been in Iceland. I wasn't there actually over our last weekend doing a sort of shoot for our portal axles, which is kind of similar, but not with 44s, but. Yeah, lifted.

[Matt Farah]

Is that going to be a production Thing.

[Lynn Calder]

It's not going to be a series production thing, but it is going to be offered in small batches.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, cool.

[Lynn Calder]

That's what we're going to launch. So in quartermaster, which is the pickup truck and the SUV. So.

[Matt Farah]

And now we've proven you can fit 44 inch tires on it. So let's go. So wait, let's exit the company. I mean, not totally, but like, how does one be? Your history is not one of a normal car company CEO. I know, it's like a totally different thing. So like, how did we get here?

[Lynn Calder]

I mean, you tell me, Matt.

[Matt Farah]

I don't know. I read like the LinkedIn version. I don't think that's the whole story.

[Lynn Calder]

No, look, you know everyone from the industry for sure, if they know about us and know anything about me at all, they'll all be like, what? Because you're right, I'm not an automotive person. I really like cars and I really like driving and it's definitely in my blood. But I did not join the automotive industry. I joined the energy industry. So I joined INEOS eight years ago and ineos and then we'll get out of the company stuff. INEOS is just a federalized group of companies. It's not a big group as such. It's just lots and lots and lots of companies that are owned by the three owners. And I joined eight years ago in the energy division and I've done a few different roles, including CEO roles for ineos. And this was devised eight years ago really by Jim, where he was kind of. I mean, he was traveling across Africa and he was just mourning the loss of this 4x4. And then cue four or five years of it being an engineering project, a passion project. How do we make this the best car ever? But very quickly towards the end of that, Jim was, do you know this needs to be a commercial success. I saw the gap in the market. This can do really well. Other people will love this car, not just me. And the ambition started to really form as something quite a bit bigger. And then as a sort of business person, he just kind of said, okay, go do it. Go make a success of it.

[Matt Farah]

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[Lynn Calder]

I was like, how are we going to find the parts? I think and yeah, I mean, I think, you know, that straight out the gate, that was the problem. Straight out the gate. For me, that was the problem. It was how do we find all the parts in the sufficient number that we need them in? So it became a really big supply chain problem at a time when supply chain was really challenging for everyone.

[Matt Farah]

2020 and 2021 is the best time to find parts.

[Lynn Calder]

We have just effectively hit every best time in this industry since we've joined Lotus.

[Matt Farah]

Really, I think did the best through his period. Totally. They had no problem.

[Zach Klapman]

Just tech.

[Matt Farah]

Textbook, textbook. Building those cars and getting them out. Go Lotus.

[Lynn Calder]

Well, I know how, I know how hard it is. It's just really hard.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, of course it is. Of course it is. Some people admit that, others not so much.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. And you know, it's hard. I mean, I genuinely love my job. My job is off the scale nuts. And I feel so privileged to have been asked to do something so left field. And I'm loving every minute it. But it's really, I can swear on this podcast. Right.

[Matt Farah]

Yes.

[Lynn Calder]

Really, really fucking hard.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, I believe you. What's the hardest part outside of supply chain? That's. That seems to be the consistent theme here today.

[Lynn Calder]

But yeah, and that's really, I mean, no one wants to talk about supply chain.

[Matt Farah]

Well, it's a legit thing that most people don't think about. This product ends in my hand, ends up in my hand. But you know, I've seen those supply chain maps before. You want to talk about like having like an overload where your brain might explode I don't know how someone looks at that and doesn't have, like, an immediate panic attack, you know, like, that's crazy. What are those charts called?

[Lynn Calder]

I don't know.

[Matt Farah]

You know. You know, I mean, I'm sure you guys do them. Just, I don't if you've ever seen the chart of, like, all these part of, like, every part in the car and it, like, almost flows together over time and, like, these parts get combined here and it's called something. I'm sorry, I sound like such a moron right now. I'm sure you have something like this in your company.

[Lynn Calder]

I've seen stuff like that from an engineering perspective where you see the parts all kind of zoomed out and then they kind of go back in. But. Yeah, I didn't know that.

[Matt Farah]

No, this is like a schedule of building a car. I think I saw at the Porsche factory or something. It was just insane. Sorry.

[Lynn Calder]

We've got a few decades before we catch up with Porsche. What's the hardest part? I mean, the weird thing about my daily life at the moment is that every day feels like it's, you know, and it's all minutiae and none of it's very exciting, but it's an adventure of extreme highs and extreme lows. And so it could be anything that, you know, the hardest part could be anything when you zoom out saying, well, actually, we've got this great product. People really like it. How do so many people don't know about us? You know, hardly. You know, so many people even go to auto shows and they're like, sorry, what's ineos? What do you guys do? So if your own industry doesn't even know when we've been around for six years, how can we expect your possible potential customer on the street to know about you? So I think brand awareness and building a brand INEOS has been around a long time, but no one knows who they are either.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, I never heard of the chemical company before the cars, to tell you the truth.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. And actually we've done some work on that recently in the US to say, well, you know, what's INEOS known for in the us and it's the car. But we still got a long way to go. We've tried getting really into sport.

[Matt Farah]

It might not be so bad. You might be able to take advantage of that.

[Lynn Calder]

Reference to chemicals, sure. But reference, we're into loads of sports. Like, you know, we own the Neos Grenadiers, which is the Formula Team Sky Road cycling team. We're a third owner in the Formula One Mercedes Formula one team. We own the America's cup yacht sailing team. Jim has just bought 28% of Manchester United.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, wow.

[Lynn Calder]

So, you know, we've got a name as it comes to sport, but trying to translate that into people buying cars, it's quite challenging. So that would be a big challenge.

[Matt Farah]

Maybe just take the name off all the stuff and just put pictures of the cars. Just take advantage. New look. Let's go.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, and look, we can do that with. Grenadier is very much our name. Right. And Grenadier, by the way, is the name of the pub that Jim had the original discussion about building this car.

[Matt Farah]

Well, that's a nice tribute.

[Lynn Calder]

It's a little pub in Belgravia in London. And that was where the kind of seminal discussion took place. And when we decided what we're going to call it, it became the Grenadier. And actually now we bought the pub.

[Matt Farah]

I was about to say, did they get points on the back end? Buying the pub is basically the same thing. Yeah, cool.

[Zach Klapman]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Now it's the INEOS Experience Center.

[Lynn Calder]

No, no, we've kept it very, very much as it is. It's a cute little pub.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, you should come. Speaking of which, I'm. I live in Los Angeles. Where can I buy an ineos? How do I get one?

[Lynn Calder]

Pasadena.

[Matt Farah]

Pasadena. Is there a proper dealer?

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, oh, really? Okay, cool.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, yeah. And we've, we've got, we've got four dealers in California actually. So we're up in Marin, we're in Orange county, we're in San Diego and Pasadena.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, okay, cool. I did. I. That thought had not occurred to me until this very minute. I figured there was, there would be a way on your website to do it. Why BMW engines?

[Lynn Calder]

So the decision predated me and I'm really, really glad that it is a BMW engine. I think that they looked at lots of different engines and I think that the engine is actually one of my favorite components of the car because it surprises me. I mean, you know, it's a straight six cylinder engine. It's, you know, it's an engine.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

It surprises me because. Or it surprised me the first time I drove it because it's responsiveness relative to what you expect from the car. The slightly retro looking, not very modern looking, super off road utilitarian vehicle. So the first time I drove it went and did a whole bunch of off road, came back down on the road, put my foot down and I'm like, whoa, this is nice. Yeah, this is fun. So relative to the size and weight of the car, the engines fund. So I think back to your question.

[Matt Farah]

Why?

[Lynn Calder]

I mean, I think we were looking for. We weren't going to build our own engine so we had to buy one. And I think we were looking for something that, you know, gave us credibility. Something that made people think, oh, it's not just someone we haven't heard of completely. It's got a credible backer. If BMW is going to work with them, then surely they're okay. Works really well obviously with the transmission, the ZF transmission that we've got. So engineering wise the whole thing just worked really well. Could have got the same thing from other OEMs and manufacturers for sure. So it was really just finding a partner.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Zach Klapman]

Did it cause friction with the F1 team?

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. I was going to say if you've got the Mercedes F1 team, they have an inline six as well.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. Well, they should have. They should have wanted to have a discussion with us.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. I was going to ask how those rounds of meetings went, but I think I know the answer already. Where. You said 50 countries. Where's. What's your biggest sales market so far?

[Lynn Calder]

America, by a long way actually.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. And is California the biggest of America?

[Lynn Calder]

It is constantly duking it out with Texas.

[Matt Farah]

Well, it's not surprising.

[Lynn Calder]

And actually it is. It's really funny. It keeps going sort of just like that. Just a little bit in terms of, you know, it's one or the other. So. 1, 2, 1, 2.

[Matt Farah]

Okay. I think we're probably at the point where I see one almost every day living here.

[Lynn Calder]

That's awesome.

[Matt Farah]

Which is cool. Yeah. There's one in my neighborhood that the guy's daily driver. Yeah. Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

Because I'm really irritated. I got into LA yesterday and you haven't seen a single Grenadier yet. And I've seen six cybertrucks.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, well, get. Be prepared to be depressed. They only get worse with time, trust me. Yeah, they're not good. No, you'll see. And you see a lot of rugged stuff as well. It's a big Land Cruiser town, big Jeep in 4Runner town. Yeah. And people modify their stuff for like super, super off roady here and then never go off road. Like there's people that drive around with those giant rooftop tents forever. They never go camping. It's just a thing really helps their weight distribution.

[Lynn Calder]

Do you know, I'll happily sell Grenadiers to anyone that wants to buy one. I think, I think that you know I think there are so many people like that and know there's nothing wrong with sort of having a car that can, if you need to.

[Matt Farah]

People drive GT3RS on the street too, and they're not going to race tracks. So like, all right, whatever. I agree. They probably would be happier with the actual thing that serves their needs is usually my point. But that's not why we buy stuff like that, is it?

[Lynn Calder]

It's emotion, it's passion. It's how you look. I mean, and that's the difference between being in automotive versus being in chemicals or an energy company. Business is business, it's always fun. I get a kick out of it, it's great. But automotive is passion, right? It gets under your skin.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Is it? I mean, companies will make excuses a lot of times for why, you know, big OEMs will make excuses for why they can't build something like this and sell it in the modern era. Whether it's pedestrian or, or crash standards or blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever emissions. And yet this is. There is, as far as I could gather, no special loophole that allows Eneos to sell vehicles in the U.S. this is like a fully U.S. it's not like ultra low volume or any of that kind of stuff. No, this is a pure, fully homologated.

[Lynn Calder]

Car, fully homologated series production car in every country that we're in. So. And yeah, I mean that was the brief was to build this super capable, super reliable, cool looking car. But obviously it had to pass, you know, emissions, pedestrian protection and be a modern vehicle in the modern world. So yeah, absolutely. Fully homologated.

[Matt Farah]

It's so because it's, you know, it has a obviously very squared off front end. And this is also fine for pedestrian in Europe. Yes. So you know, man, why you guys can make a square car and our square cars just like murder people, like all the American square cars are like murder machines because they have like 5 foot plus tall hood. The hood on this is actually, is actually quite low. Lower than a wrangler, I think.

[Lynn Calder]

Right. I actually don't know if it's lower than a wrangler. I'm not sure that would be true. I'm gonna hang it up.

[Matt Farah]

It's pretty close. That photo of what looks like George Russell standing, I mean he's a tall boy. For a racing driver. For a racing driver he is. But the hood is basically at his waist in that photograph. Unless there's some really funky perspective happening there. I recall it was not that tall, but I don't know, you Guys, Why? What is the special sauce that. Are they all just lying?

[Lynn Calder]

No, I don't think. Well, maybe lying is a bit of a strong word, but I think that was a bit of our enjoyment as well, was where people say they can't do it. Well, we're going to do it now. I guess it's maybe back to your point, Zach. It's kind of, it's volume and economics. You know, they probably felt like they weren't going to sell enough of these to be viable, but they could sell, you know, 200,000 eggy versions and, you know, we're just sort of taking a tack, which is we want to build this car and that's the car that we're going to build in homologate, but absolutely no loopholes. It's gone through every legal testing that every other car has to go through.

[Matt Farah]

How many of these a year do you need to build to be happy as CEO, do you know?

[Lynn Calder]

I mean, we've talked a lot about this magic 30,000 a year number and we haven't got there quite yet. That's not a break even number though. That's higher than a break even number. So that's me kind of saying I'd be overperforming, completely washing my face in terms of the investment I need to make back into my business. Because we need to keep doing a lot, lot to remain legal, actually, particularly in Europe, like new engines, new pedestrian protection, new autonomous driving. I mean, pretty much it's a treadmill of horror. But I also have optimism beyond that. We've got a factory that's bigger than that. I kind of see 30,000 thinking that sounds reasonable. In 50 countries, I'd be happy with that. But we're winners. We, we want to knock it out of the park and you know, if the demand is a bit higher than that, we can totally satisfy that from Handbach. And that's when I think I'd be happy if I'm like, not just outperforming but like smashing it, like maxing out the factory. Yeah, like that's when I will feel happy. But we're a long way away from that.

[Matt Farah]

When you guys, were you there when they acquired the factory?

[Lynn Calder]

No.

[Matt Farah]

Okay, so you walked in and the factory was there.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Okay, so I, so, so does it, is it appropriate for me to say what at the old factory could be like reused? Or was it just like start from scratch but in this giant empty building?

[Lynn Calder]

Actually, no, the complete opposite. So Mercedes had conceived that they were going to build one of their EVs there. And they had put hundreds of millions into a new body shop and a new paint shop. They then did like a worldwide rationalization of their production plants and decided to do something different. So we actually walked into a state of the art, brand new furnished paint shop.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, cool. Well, that's nice.

[Lynn Calder]

So it really has been, I think, a huge. We talked about sort of COVID and supply chain crises and stuff. Like, I think if we'd had to build from scratch, I probably wouldn't be sitting here talking to you right now for a number of reasons. Yeah. But, yeah, it has been a really, really awesome thing for us.

[Matt Farah]

That's super cool. Yeah. And now in sort of in the luxury space, customization, really important. You know, Porsche charging anywhere between 5 and $25,000 for colors, you know, different fabrics, leather, stuff like that. I just drove a Bentley with $100,000 in options on it, which is I.

[Lynn Calder]

Need to go and, you know, we need to do better.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, you could charge a lot more. But is that something that your customers are really asking for customization and personalization or less so.

[Lynn Calder]

No, definitely. And it was always part of the plan as well. It's a vehicle that really lends itself to customization, and we're just getting started on that, really. So the portal axles would be a great example. But we also launched our sub brand earlier this year in the summer, actually. It's called Arcane Works, and that's going to be our bespoke personalization brand. So effectively now, as at today, you can go on and order any color you like, and you can, you know, really start to play around with the trim and stuff. And we want to take that brand in a few different directions. So that's our first. We kind of did our first one to. It's called the Detour. And really, this first one is really just trim. You know, we've just really refined a lot of it. It's got new wheels, it's got, you know, cashmere headliner. It's got really, really cashmere.

[Zach Klapman]

That's nice.

[Matt Farah]

You know, cashmere headliner is pretty good. I'll take that.

[Lynn Calder]

But we haven't sort of started thinking about sort of grinding up diamonds and putting in the paint yet or so.

[Matt Farah]

You'Ve heard about the diamonds, huh? Who told you about my diamond car? I've seen diamonds. I've seen gold.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, Gold.

[Matt Farah]

The woven. Have you seen the woven gold?

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, I've heard about these slightly crazy things.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Have you seen like Meteorite? You see that one?

[Lynn Calder]

No.

[Matt Farah]

There's a Meteor dust one too.

[Lynn Calder]

This is the. Well, you know, which just becomes, you know, dust. Right.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah. No, it's. You can't even. Yeah, it's black. The car's black. It's basically. It's the old mother of pearl. That would actually be kind of rad. The mother of pearl.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. I mean, at least you'd maybe see something.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

Diamond, not so much.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, I like, you know, materials and stuff. You gotta have. You gotta have a tartan. Some tartans. You need a. You need a Highlands edition.

[Lynn Calder]

I have like really sort of lost, you know, I probably lost my entire countryman by not having suggested that already.

[Matt Farah]

Seriously. Yeah, I. When I went to Scotland, they had some crazy custom shooting vehicles with all of the tartans and you can embrace that stuff. It's great.

[Lynn Calder]

It. It is. Can't believe that I've come to LA to.

[Matt Farah]

To be told that I need to.

[Lynn Calder]

Be a tartan in the car.

[Matt Farah]

I mean, I love, love a tartan in the car.

[Lynn Calder]

Ashamed.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. So, you know, the, the analog nature of the interior and, and all that. Is it. Was it a directive of you need to be able to use gloves like older Land Rovers were? Or was it like. No, no. People just want knobs for stuff.

[Lynn Calder]

People just want knobs for stuff.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

You know, everyone's just. I think there's. There's just a bit of malaise and, and, you know, again, there's, you know, lots and lots of tech and software driven vehicles, smartphones on wheels. It works for a lot of people. I just think there's a people who.

[Matt Farah]

Love their phones and hate their cars.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, there's a lot of those people that hate driving.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

They suck. And I'm not one of those people. And we as a team are not those people. And we hark back to. It's not just about harking back to something that was. It's harking back to something that we all just really like and enjoy and we all like driving. And if you're messing about with all the screens, you're not driving. If the car is doing everything for you, you're not driving.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

So buttons and knobs. Yeah. There's a bit of antidote to the millions of screens, but there's also an ease of use. Right. You know, if you're in a bit of a sticky situation in an off road environment where you're doing something a little bit tricky, then you don't want to have to be thinking about, oh, my God, what do I do here? What do I Do you know, it's basically just knobs, buttons, switches, just all the things. And we're all tactile humans. We love a bit of just knobs.

[Matt Farah]

Buttons and switches behind all. Like, does all of that, like, take apart that panel that looks like an old 747? Behind all that is there just like a USB cable and it's doing it computerized anyway. It's just locked, lying to us convincingly, which is fine.

[Lynn Calder]

No, So, I mean, it's not a completely analog car, obviously. It can't be in today's environment. So, you know, we've got a wiring harness that, you know, looks relatively scary and doesn't look like an analog car. We've got, you know, I think we.

[Matt Farah]

Also perfect for Crossing Africa, I might add. Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

We've got something like 37, I think, electronic control units, but I think those eggy crossovers have got something like 150 electronic control units.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

So you would take that panel off and you'd definitely see some wiring. But when it comes to the crux of the car, you know, our differential locks are completely mechanical. There's nothing in there that's just, you know, some wizardry behind. It's all completely mechanical. But sure, there are some electronics in the car you can't really avoid. We've got, you know, electric windows. You buy the field. So you've got heated seats.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's just. I don't know, it's a. Now we're at a point where in order to undo some of our, you know, we want to undo the screens without undoing the stuff that works behind the interface. So I was just wondering if the stuff behind was still the same. Yeah, no, it is undoing the interface.

[Lynn Calder]

It's not. No. It's vastly different under the COVID as well. It's a fraction, as I say, less than a third of what everyone else would be doing by way of electronics. And I think we have. Have, wherever we could, stripped it back down to analog mechanical. And where we couldn't, we've kind of gone with the bare minimum. We wanted to make something that was modern and refined as well. We didn't want it to be, you know, wind down the window and, you know, be cold and not be able to hear anyone because we hadn't put any thought into noise and acoustics. Yeah. Or for it not to be smooth or for. Yeah. If you want not to have, you know, people like heated seats, you pretty.

[Matt Farah]

Much want to turn back the clock to, like, 2010.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. Not like 1960.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah. There's a, there's a point beyond which it's like this car will work and you don't have to worry about it. And it has enough. Yeah, but not too much because there's.

[Zach Klapman]

A difference between like having the niceties and the luxuries and then the interface that controls those things. And I think the problem I have a lot of times is that the. If the control for the heated seat function is not up on that screen or a button and have to go into a menu to do it now it's like two motor skills to activate that thing when it used to just be like, I can see the knob in the picture, like it's just hit the button and it's on. So we just want the simple action, but we like the modern convenience.

[Matt Farah]

Is there anything about. And your answer may be a little reserved to this and you'll see why in a second, but is there anything about. You buy engines for. From BMW and presumably that's on a friendly term because you're buying a lot and they like what their engines are going in. Is there anything about using that engine that limits you in any way? Like, okay, well you have to use this interface. You have to think this has to look like this. Outside of just engine goes in car, there's nothing else that constrains you.

[Lynn Calder]

No, it's not. And I'm not very reserved actually, so I'm good. No, it's not. I mean we teamed up with the ZF8 speed, which is.

[Matt Farah]

Which they already do, they are doing.

[Lynn Calder]

But that was a choice as well. And even the kind of automatic gears shifter, we used the BMW version of that. We didn't need to. That's maybe something we would look at in the future. So no, it's not one of those situations where you share a platform with someone and then they dictate or they have to then dictate everything else that goes on in your vehicle, including quite often the wiring, the software, the head unit.

[Matt Farah]

Not to single out Lotus again, but their four cylinder Amira, which uses the Mercedes AMG four cylinder, they were telling us when that car first came out they couldn't tune the gearbox. It was Mercedes tune on the gearbox, which that car comes out of a crossover, you need a different gearbox. Tune.

[Lynn Calder]

And when we think about the future and we think about, oh, would we look at platform sharing in the future to see if we could be a bit more savvy, bit more economics driven, that's always the answer, is that you're then completely beholden you're beholden to every update they do. You're beholden if they cease production of it and move on to something new. I think it's difficult not to be in charge of your own destiny. So this is purely really just parts. Parts procurement.

[Matt Farah]

Okay, cool. We have a bunch of questions from our patrons and I want to make sure we have time for them. And of course, if you want to ask questions of our guests, if you want to get on the live show, if you want to get the show ahead of everybody else, if you want to get it without ads and more and more and more. Patreon.com the Smoking Tire podcast is where you do it. So let's go. Tim A says it does. I have not. Zach has pre screened these. I have not. So Tim A says, do you think the typical INEOS customer uses it as a daily driver? And as the Grenadier iterates over time, would you want to make it more luxurious or more conventional to meet that demand? Conventional, I assume means rugged.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. Great question. I think that actually the nuance of that is that I think no is the short answer. I don't think that people bought the Grenadier from our customers to date necessarily to have it as their daily drive. They bought it either to be an off road vehicle or a toy or a weekend car. But what we do find is that A, that's changing and B, even those people that bought it thinking it wouldn't be their daily driver, so many of them actually say to me, I still choose it every day when I come out and I'm deciding, you know, if I'm lucky enough to have more than one car. And I'm deciding, I'm deciding on the Grenadier because it's just that feeling you get when you're driving it, right? And it's just, you can't bottle it. You can't really describe it. It's just, it's just fun.

[Matt Farah]

Well, it helps if a car has a personality. And this thing does have a personality.

[Lynn Calder]

It does.

[Matt Farah]

And a lot of cars don't. Some do. Some do, but not many.

[Zach Klapman]

Can I ask before we do you have any cool cars in your personal garage? You said, you said you like driving and you said it's in your blood. So what is your driving car? Nerd background?

[Lynn Calder]

So I have got Gren Deer as my daily driver and I love that a lot. But I do also like some other things as well. So I've got, probably my most fun car is a GT4RS.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, yeah. Okay.

[Zach Klapman]

It's a good one.

[Matt Farah]

Okay. As soon as you walked in, you said, that's a GT2RS. I was like, okay. You know, all right, so you have four rs. What color?

[Lynn Calder]

Silver.

[Matt Farah]

Okay, okay. Very nice choice.

[Lynn Calder]

So, yeah, where does that car live? So it lives in the uk. It gets kind of tucked up at night in a place like yours downstairs. And yeah, my. I want to track race it, not drive around the streets or go get coffee in it.

[Matt Farah]

So that's an excellent car. Good for you.

[Lynn Calder]

Love it.

[Matt Farah]

What else?

[Lynn Calder]

I've got a Mini, of course, as is tradition, because it's. Yeah, it's. I actually live in Monaco, which is a really weird place to live, but it's really sort of.

[Matt Farah]

Unless you're like Charles LeClaire and then it's totally normal.

[Lynn Calder]

And I am nothing like him on many levels. It's. Yeah, it's just really easy to get around in.

[Matt Farah]

New Mini or not an old and a classic Mini or new one?

[Lynn Calder]

No, unfortunately, it's a new one. I don't actually have any classic cars in my garage yet that I need to fix that. I was loving your little speedster downstairs.

[Matt Farah]

Not my speedster, I assure you. But that is a very, very nice car. Yeah, old Porsches are. They're great because they're easy. They're easy to drive.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, I definitely, really. I was chatting to one of the team the other day and he said he had a 1971 911. I was like, probably great. It's amazing.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, probably great. GT4RS is all right. And a Mini. You're in the club. Yeah, you're in the club. Brad says, great work on making the Grenadier such a low key if, you know, you know, vehicle. How hard was that to keep it low key and not over the top with badging and logos. Was there a temptation to put logos all over it?

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, and I, you know, that's a lovely compliment. That kind of makes me feel like it's something we regret a little bit. And look, we're not going to change it, but it is. You're spot on, Brad. You know, lots of people are like, oh, what is that? And that's quite hard when you're trying to get awareness up and you want people to know what it is rather than sort of say what is. So I often say that my job will be done when people stop saying, what is that?

[Zach Klapman]

Yeah, good point. Yeah.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. You should give people a couple months, like a couple months credit on their payments to just have a huge plaque on their door that says it's an Enios Google.

[Zach Klapman]

It's like, you know, the Raptor. They really did it.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Terry King. Any plans for a two door? I think it would look good as a $2.

[Lynn Calder]

It would look very good as a two door. And actually someone came to me with a design the other day for the pickup truck. The quartermaster in two door version, which would take a fair bit of development, but we're definitely looking at shorter wheelbase for sure. But no announcement launch date anytime soon.

[Matt Farah]

Have any safari lodges in Africa bought them yet to turn into the stadium seating safari vehicles?

[Lynn Calder]

Do a little search on the Inios Grenadier Safari viewer.

[Matt Farah]

Oh yeah. I went to the South African safari and they were using like a 2015 defender.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, yeah.

[Matt Farah]

And they were like, this is the last one we can get. This is the end of it. Oh, look at that. Hell yeah. Oh, that one's got like lounge chairs in the back. That one is pimpin.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, we went to town and actually we actually the modifier that did this for us is based in Botswana.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, that's kick ass.

[Lynn Calder]

We actually acquired the company two years ago as well. Did you actually own the Botswana company?

[Matt Farah]

Can you homologate this vehicle? Because that would be for what, driving around Los Angeles for LA Airport shuttle from Westside Collector.

[Zach Klapman]

No, you don't want, you want to.

[Matt Farah]

Be like taking a biplane.

[Zach Klapman]

Oh God.

[Lynn Calder]

I think a single single type approval for one. You could do that.

[Matt Farah]

I mean, look, I rode in one of these that was Land Rover based. And the seats in this one look like they're out of Michael Jordan's movie theater at his house. Those are, are some lazy boys. That's proper. But you know what? It doesn't have the bow rider. You need the bow rider seat. The one where the guide hangs off the nose. Yeah, you need the bow rider seat to complete the look. But I am impressed, Lynn. That looks rad. And now you can just build those.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah, yeah.

[Matt Farah]

If I come to England, can I just roll one of those around?

[Lynn Calder]

We've got one in England.

[Matt Farah]

Do you really?

[Lynn Calder]

Because we took it over for Goodwood.

[Matt Farah]

Can I get that as a press car?

[Lynn Calder]

It went up the hill in Goodwood.

[Matt Farah]

Dude, let me get that as a press car for a week.

[Lynn Calder]

That I actually drove it which wasn't obviously quite with the same impact, but I drove it through mount in Botswana. So you know, the safari vehicles don't normally come to the main city. So I was just sort of quite happily driving through the city and it's awesome.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, that one I was in had like, you know, 50,000 low range kilometers. It was unbelievable. It was so cool. That looks great. Very well done here for Matt's cats. I'm a cat guy. What is the flaw in EVs that Eneo seeks to correct and what makes your approach different from other OE? Have you said something about a flaw in EVs that you seek to correct?

[Lynn Calder]

I've said plenty about EVs but I'm not sure that we're seeking to correct. I think that my kind of stance on EV is just that. And it's just having a puppet regulators like, you know, regulators less so in the US but still definitely in Europe. It's just, okay, we need to decarbonize. So electric go. And the OEMs all kind of run at it to say, well, we got Billegal, we got to sell cars. And what we're finding in Europe right now is it's really faltering and I think it could start faltering here as well if incentives change. And I think that we're trying to force something when the infrastructure isn't there, when the clean energy isn't there and when people don't necessarily. It doesn't work for everyone's daily lives. And so disclaimer.

[Matt Farah]

You work for a petroleum company, right?

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. Okay, can we just like, I've got really strong opinions.

[Matt Farah]

Lay that on there real quick.

[Lynn Calder]

But, but actually it's not about.

[Matt Farah]

I don't disagree with you, but.

[Lynn Calder]

And I. So I am going to qualify what you said because you're absolutely right and that is my stance in life. But it's not about being a gas guzzling 4x4 energy company that doesn't give a shit about the environment. Actually, I think decarbonization zero, getting to zero emissions from tailpipe when we've got that many cars on the road that I've just seen coming to Culver City here is really important and I think we take that really seriously. I think my stance on EV is that if governments mandate it and people don't buy it, all they're going to do is keep their older, dirtier cars for longer and actually the whole thing fails. Whereas actually I just take a bit of a more rational approach, which is you need to keep a mix of things on the road for longer and you will improve over a longer period of time. So EV will take up a huge part of it. But we also need hybrids and in Europe they're going to ban them because they've got a combustion engine component that seems very silly. I Just think it's nuts, it's insane. And that's my, my issue with EVs. It's not a pop at EVs. We're going to build one because we think there is a market for it. It's a pop at people that think there's one solution to a very complex problem.

[Matt Farah]

I mean, yeah, in America we've got that too. We have an EV mandate of sorts in California. And as we know, the rest of the country follows California. And it's not really tenable in its current form here. A lot of people like EVs for what they're good at. The sports car people we talk to don't like evs for many enthusiast car reasons. And I think people should buy the thing they like. And I do like hybridization a lot because it electrifies more. I mean, I just did 385 miles here to Arizona in the new Bentley Speed Hybrid. 740 horsepower and I did 26 miles an gallon at high speed going across the desert. Like that's pretty good. Pretty good. Like that's a substantial improvement on the last one. So. Yeah, absolutely. But, but so you're doing a. Eventually a Grenadier ev, it won't be a Grenadier.

[Lynn Calder]

So that's the other flaw, I suppose, is that our kind of body on frame platform in the Grenadier does not lend itself particularly well to electric just because weight mainly. And so what we launched earlier this year was the Fusilier. And it's on pause until we get a little bit of clarity about whether combustion engines are going to be banned because we're going to offer it in pure electric and Range Extender. The Range Extender has got a small combustion engine that powers the battery.

[Matt Farah]

I like Range Extender. Range Extender is good.

[Lynn Calder]

It's such a fantastic. I mean, you know, part of the reason people are stuttering with picking up EVs is range anxiety. And the range extender takes away 80% of the emissions and all of the range anxiety.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

So for me, it's a fantastic transition technology. And at the moment it would be bad.

[Matt Farah]

It's just like if hybrids are the, you know, one third of the way to the, to an EV, range extenders like 2/3 of the way to the EV. And my wife, you know, my wife who drives all the stuff that I drive, you know, I've been talking, talking about, you know, hybrids, whatever, 50 miles on electric and then, you know, the infinite on gas, and she goes, why can't I have like 250 on electric and then like another hundred on the gas for if I just need that last little bit. I think that's coming.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah. And I think it's great. But in Europe right now would be banned. So our fusilier concept is extremely capable 4x4 but not with the body on frame. It's got a monocoque. It is. You know we're working really hard to make it as capable as the Grenadier. Probably not. You know this will always be the marquee off road vehicle. Thank you, Zach. And we want to offer it in range extender. We would just like a bit of clarity from the various governments around the world that they're not going to ban it.

[Matt Farah]

Sure. Do you really think that combustion engines, do you think they'll actually get to the ban? You don't think they'll kick it down the field a little bit?

[Lynn Calder]

I don't think they'll get to the ban, no. But we were talking about, you know, the level of investment to potentially have a two year window of sales is a risk that we are too small to take. But no, I don't think the ban will happen. I think that, you know, it's an easy thing that the can has been kicked down the road a few times but it's actually in the UK they're trying to bring it back to 2030. 2030 is tomorrow.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah, yeah. You know in car building that's. That's now.

[Lynn Calder]

And therefore I think they just very quickly run out of room and just go, all right, well we just have to extend it.

[Matt Farah]

That keeps happening here as well. They keep doing exactly the same thing. Can you go back, Zach?

[Zach Klapman]

Oh, sorry.

[Matt Farah]

Okay. We have Terry again says Desinios hope the Grenadier will gain the same following as Land Rover has. We're in 30 years plus people will be restoring or arrest nobody them to cope with whatever the modern world is now. That's an interesting one. I want, I wonder if it would be possible for you guys or somebody to build a vehicle that is sort of designed to be upgraded over time with modern. I mean it's almost impossible to do that, isn't it?

[Lynn Calder]

That's complex enough my brain is. Because yeah, what we're trying to do is just so crazy as it is, I think. I mean these are cars that are already on the road. You know, legislation's not affecting cars that are already on the road. And despite what I've just been saying about older, dirtier cars staying on the road for longer, this has got a state of of the art engine in it and combustion engines have improved in emissions by 50% over the last 20 years. So it's not a dirty car. And I think that I do hope that it will become the icon that we want it to be. And I think if we compare it to a lot of the electric vehicles. Again, I'm having a pop at electric vehicles. I really don't mean to. I think there are a lot of vehicles on the road today that are. I kind of liken to like fast fashion, you know, they are appliances.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

And our car will be on the road in 50 years time, no problem. It is extremely robust.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. I just watched a documentary literally this morning on the elliptical machine about electronic waste and I was just like, oh my God. And I'm 45 minutes into a 90 minute documentary and they haven't mentioned electric cars yet. But I'm like they're probably not going to get there. But I couldn't help but think about the e waste of electric cars compared to a car, at least an enthusiast car that's on the road for 50, 60, 70 years. Pretty sure I know the answer to this one. But Squirkle wants to know plans to make an AMG or M competitor performance model. Have you looked at this thing? Don't do that. Stop.

[Lynn Calder]

No, I think we did. Another of the prototypes we did in the summer was we put a V8 in a Grenadier and that was fun.

[Matt Farah]

BMW V8?

[Lynn Calder]

No, it wasn't a BMW V8, of.

[Matt Farah]

Course, it's an LS motor. It's always an LS motor.

[Lynn Calder]

I think we did it as a bit of a sort of fun project. So I'm not going to say which engine it is, but it was phenomenally fun. So yeah, I think we would probably look at doing something like that. Not in series production, probably in small series production. But yeah, I think doing something like that it does lend itself to a really sort of nice growly engineering for sure.

[Matt Farah]

Especially if you get your Iceland guy going and you do the 44 long travel. Yeah, yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

Now we're talking music ears.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Timbo says, besides the us, what are your next two biggest markets?

[Lynn Calder]

So our next biggest market is the UK and our next biggest market after that is Australia. That tracks, I'd say the uk. Australia. I've got to mention a fourth, I guess because uk, Australia, Germany always kind of tag quite along. So I think Germany is kind of sitting at the bottom of that at the moment, but not by much.

[Matt Farah]

I feel like Germany is not what I think of when I think of off road culture?

[Lynn Calder]

No, but they're big into their cars. They are, yeah. They are interested in automobile life. I think it will be interesting to see how it tracks in the future though, I think.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. Mr. Meowgie, again, lots of cat references. Any plan? Wait, isn't the quartermaster going on sale in the US or is it on.

[Lynn Calder]

Sale in the US it is on sale. The order books are open. We had a few at the show today, but you won't see any yet on the roads. But you will from Q1 next year.

[Matt Farah]

Okay, answered. You can get it here. We'll leave that one up top. Oh, my God. Josh says I daily drive a short wheelbase series 3 land rover all summer in a small coastal. Okay, wait, what tire? Oh, this is a tire question on a Land Rover.

[Zach Klapman]

Oh, sorry, we can skip the.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, these are.

[Zach Klapman]

These are for us.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, these are for us.

[Lynn Calder]

Yeah.

[Zach Klapman]

This is like a shotgun question.

[Matt Farah]

Got it, got it, got it. What? While you're in town, what LA things are you going to do? Any of them.

[Lynn Calder]

So I am going to Koreatown tonight for some dinner. Perfect. And I am doing a little hike up to the holiday Hollywood Hills tomorrow.

[Matt Farah]

Oh, Runyon. You do Runyon.

[Lynn Calder]

I'm doing Runyon in the morning.

[Matt Farah]

Do you know, have you done it before?

[Lynn Calder]

I have done it before.

[Matt Farah]

Okay. Yeah.

[Lynn Calder]

Quite a long time ago though, so I'm excited.

[Matt Farah]

Celebs, people taking calls, like, while doing the hike. Lots of Starbucks. Hard hike, but you wouldn't know it from the people watching.

[Lynn Calder]

Oh. So I'm now thinking about. I did a hike. And again, it's not a difficult hike, particularly in Edinburgh, which is kind of broadly where I'm from, where they've got a mountain in the middle of the city called Arthur Seat. It doesn't take very long to get up. It's not super hard. I. Which is really awesome. But talking about Starbucks and celebs and people on their phone. I went up there a few months ago and there was a guy walking his cat on a leash. On a leash.

[Matt Farah]

So listen, I would make friends with that guy and the cat and respect. It's kind of a. It is a bit Scottish to be walking your cat.

[Lynn Calder]

I mean, by the labors. I've never seen anyone in Scotland walking their cat before.

[Matt Farah]

It feels Scottish to a dumb American. What a great city though.

[Zach Klapman]

Ed knows the social norms of cat ownership in Scotland.

[Matt Farah]

Listen, I can just picture it. That's about him. That's about as much education as I need on that topic.

[Zach Klapman]

You're confusing imagination with education.

[Matt Farah]

Yes, that's exactly. Yes, I am. But I could still picture that hill. A guy in a kilt with a cat.

[Lynn Calder]

Pretty much any, any Saturday in Edinburgh.

[Matt Farah]

Lovely town, though. What a great place. Thank you for giving us an hour of your time and coming to us. Very nice of you.

[Lynn Calder]

Thank you so much, guys for having me. That was really, really fun.

[Matt Farah]

I'm really excited. We're gonna drive the car next week. You're getting me the off roady one, right?

[Lynn Calder]

The trial.

[Matt Farah]

The trial master, yeah. Cool. Super excited. I've been bugging Colleen for probably two years about driving one.

[Lynn Calder]

I'm sorry that's taken this long and I'd really, really love to hear what think of it.

[Matt Farah]

We will give you notes. Thank you to our patrons. Have a happy Thanksgiving. We're not putting out a show on Thanksgiving Day because no one will be there to listen to it. So I hope you all have a great holiday with your family and we'll see you next time. And Lynn, it's been a real pleasure. Come see us next year when you're back in LA and we can hopefully take one of these off roading together.

[Lynn Calder]

That would be awesome.

[Matt Farah]

Yeah. And if you want to ship a fun car here, you know who to you know who to call your friends at Westside Collector Car Storage. If you want to drive our mountains, your GT4Rs.

[Lynn Calder]

Fantastic. Thanks so much both thanks kids.

[Matt Farah]

Happy Thanksgiving. See you next time. Bye.