Middle East will account for between 10 and 20 per cent of the overall sales volume of McLaren Automotive’s high performance sports cars, the company said.

The company will launch the first in its range of high performance sports cars from spring 2011.

The announcement follows the world debut of the new McLaren MP4-12C at the McLaren Technology Centre in Woking, England, where the two most recent Formula 1 world champions, Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton, unveiled the new car.

The MP4-12C will be sold through a high-quality, dedicated and profitable global retail network located in the most popular and mature regions for sports car sales, it said.

“McLaren Automotive believes that its partners will be both commercially successful and committed to the launch of a new brand that is set to challenge the world’s best sports car businesses,” the company said.

McLaren Automotive plans to initially sell the 12C across 19 countries. The company will be represented throughout the region through a retail network in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE.

The search for retail partners has been moving quickly across the Middle East, a region of particular importance for the company, the statement said.

So far, around 30 applications have been received for regional dealership franchises, and the selection process has reached the shortlist stage. Moreover, the UAE and Saudi Arabia, the two countries in the region that are expected to account for the bulk of the sales, are now at letter-of-intent stage, with an announcement set to be made shortly, it said.

“We have been making significant progress in finding the right representatives to market the MP4-12C, the first in our range of high performance sports cars,” said Ian Gorsuch, McLaren Automotive’s regional director for the Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific. “The Middle East is not only important because it will account for up to 20 per cent of overall sales, but because it is also full of highly-educated car enthusiasts who will appreciate the excellence of the MP4-12C.”
 
Across the world, up to 1,000 12Cs will be delivered in 2011, with early indications from over 1,600 customer registrations on the company’s website validating McLaren Automotive’s strategy of developing a high-quality, performance-oriented sports car, the company said.

McLaren Automotive anticipates developing a full range of high performance sports cars by the middle of the decade, it said. - TradeArabia News Service