If the issue with UK cars is type approval, as suggested by
@TomE and expanded upon by
@JohnHoward, if Lotus missed the July 1st cut off for approval, will the Emira be fitted with a speed limiter and lane assist etc? I imagine that would be a deal breaker for a number of people, including me. A Lotus, as well as any proper sports car is to be driven. It's not supposed to drive you.
This is exactly what I have been thinking regarding the revised legislation, but I have been reluctant to comment on it as I seem to be constantly having a go at Lotus and it pains me to be like that.
I think that there may be two further problems for Lotus to overcome. The first one is the very well publicised chip shortage, If Lotus suddenly need a batch of chips, they are going to find themselves in the same shoes as a latecomer Emira depositor i.e. at the back of the queue.
The second potential issue is that we know from photos of prototypes that Lotus were working on ADAS, but this was dropped for the FE V6, but we do not know why. We could assume that it is the aforementioned chip shortage, but it could be that they could not get it to work in the way they wanted. Of course full ADAS is not compatible with the current steering setup of the V6. As they pushed ahead with the development of the car minus ADAS, further changes especially in the ECU and electronics may have sent them down a one-way street, meaning that retrofitting elements of ADAS is not possible.
But this does not explain why European/ROW Type Approval has been achieved. This next paragraph is purely conjecture and I have no evidence for it, but I do have life experience of this type of situation. I think this may be human factors. As I mentioned in a previous post, my career before I retired was in a very highly regulated environment, government inspectors watched our every move. Part of my role was maintaining relationships with these inspectors and some of them were very challenging. I can easily see a situation where an inspector has taken it upon themselves to give Lotus a hard time, either in the hope they will make a name for themselves, or perhaps because they have fallen out with whoever is responsible for managing the relationship. I know that this may sound a little far fetched, but I saw this with my own eyes and managed this kind of thing on a daily basis
With EU/ROW approval being a completely separate process and of course different sets of inspectors, this problem that I describe would not occur.
I have said with previous things I have written, that I hope I am wrong, in fact, I would be delighted to be wrong and if I am I will apologise. I still want my Emira (despite a voice in my head saying Alpine A110), I want Lotus to continue to be a successful UK manufacturer providing jobs for many on site and supporting many more families, jobs, industry and commerce in their supply chain. I just wish they would be truthful with us.
with the excitement of knowing we now will be told what QUARTER !!!! ours cars may turn up 
Probably don’t commit to a year either…….. 
that keeps on giving but doesn’t turn up at Christmas Lotus delaying Christmas 
this year
