The announcement of Group Lotus' plans for 2011 comes despite Tony Fernandes pushing on with his plans to race as Team Lotus next year - with his outfit now also having Renault engines and set to run in black and gold colours.

Group Lotus CEO Dany Bahar, who has been pushing aggressively for his company's return to motorsport, added: "I can think of no better platform for automotive brand communications than motorsport and F1 is the very pinnacle of open-wheel racing.

"We're well aware that there has been a lot of controversy around the usage of our brand in F1 and I'm delighted to be able to formally clarify our position once and for all: we are Lotus and we are back."

Green and Yellow - 77%.
Black and gold - 15%.
Red and gold 4%.
Others - 4%.
Seems pretty conclusive

Ah it came from JA's site.
Click to enlarge

Group Lotus boss Danny Bahar, who now controls 25% of the Enstone based team (livery above), went on BBC Radio Norfolk today to talk about his plans for the company. He brushed off the confusion, saying that it suits him to have four Lotus cars on the grid as it doubles his brand exposure, he’s getting free advertising from Tony Fernandes’ team – but I’m not sure we should believe him on that. This is an unworkable situation from a business point of view, which will cause difficulty for the sponsors of both teams and they will be pressing for a resolution.

“I have nothing against it,” said Bahar. “It’s not a problem for me, four are better than two. The controversy has been mainly pushed out by Media, it’s been dealt with by our shareholders together with 1 Malaysia Team.” (the Norfolk based team)

The two sides will face each other around a table tomorrow at the F1 commission meeting, which is attended by the team principals of all F1 teams, plus circuit owners, sponsors, tyre company, FIA and Bernie Ecclestone

I know they are pretty much the same, but I prefer that one. Must be the lack or red endplates, but there's something else I can't put my finger on. Perhaps it's just because it was photographed against a black background instead of white.

There seems to be quite a discussion on the JA website on whether the black and gold livery would be against EU law as it's supposedly blatantly representative of JPS and therefore advertising cigarettes just as Ferrari's barcode on the car did.

So while the colour scheme is clearly evocative of JPS, I think it's stretching it to say it's advertising cigarettes - if only for the reason that there is no money involved.

There seems to be quite a discussion on the JA website on whether the black and gold livery would be against EU law as it's supposedly blatantly representative of JPS and therefore advertising cigarettes just as Ferrari's barcode on the car did.

There seems to be quite a discussion on the JA website on whether the black and gold livery would be against EU law as it's supposedly blatantly representative of JPS and therefore advertising cigarettes just as Ferrari's barcode on the car did.

Lukehmuse had a pic on twitter of the other Lotus in black and gold, it looked awesome. Must go see if I can find it again.