Eterniti Hemera: The tease continues

The new car company that calls itself Eterniti has revealed a new photo of its first ‘Super-SUV’ – the Eterniti Hemera – ahead of its debut at Frankfurt next week.

You may remember that we ran a story a few weeks ago about a mysterious ‘new’ luxury SUV from a new car company – the Eterniti Hemera.

Well, they’re back with a bit more of a drip-feed of information as the debut of their first car – which they dub “… the world’s first Super-SUV” – grows closer.

We’d speculated that Eterniti wasn’t a car maker but was instead an after-market customiser; simply taking an existing car and making it ‘special’. A bit like Gemballa or Merdad. And as it seems the underpinnings for the Hemera are the Porsche Cayenne, the comparisons to Gemballa and Merdad seem very valid.

We do now know a bit more about Eterniti than we did before, but not a huge amount.

We do think it’s Chinese money behind the enterprise, and we know that the ‘Engineering’ team is headed up by Alastair MacQueen (no, not the recently departed  couturier), a man with a good reputation, involved in the XJ220 project, three le Mans wins with Jaguar and Bentley under his belt and a man Ross Brawn called ‘a master of race strategy’.

Also lined up as a ‘face’ for Eterniti is former F1 driver Johnny Herbert (coincidentally, the cousin of my children’s mother), himself a former Le Mans winner, who will be a ‘Brand Ambassador’ for Eterniti and have an active involvement in vehicle development.

Interestingly, and maybe completely unrelated, is the fact that both Johnny and Alastair were heavily involved with Eddie Jordan in their careers. Another ‘name’ to add to Eterniti’s list, perhaps?

There seems little doubt that there is decent, probably Chinese, money behind the Eterniti project, especially with Eterniti stating that Eterniti is:

…backed by a group of international investors and has been established by people who have a passion for cars. The team has extensive experience in retailing some of the most prestigious British and European luxury and high-performance car brands, in markets from the UK to Asia-Pacific. It has further experience in the development and manufacture of high-end components and motor sport.

As you already know from the previous story, Eterniti see the Hemera as a £150-200k super SUV with every possible whistle and bell they (and their customers) can conceive of. It will be based in London, but we can’t see the UK market being a huge one for them.

It seems likely the Hemera is aimed squarely at the new wealthy in emerging markets and Middle East clients and, with money and ‘names’ behind it, it could make an impact.

Even if you are really just buying a titivated Cayenne.