#RonDennis

McLaren is using 13 of its most valuable historic race cars as collateral in order to rid itself of the last vestiges Ron Dennis’ rule.  

McLaren is setting its sight on Ferrari and Lamborghini, and is set to spend $1 billion to develop 13 new models and variants, according to a Bloomberg report.

Ron Dennis, chairman of McLaren, was given a 6-month license suspension after running a red light near his home in Surrey, England. Having already racked up 9 demerit points on his license through previous speeding fines, Dennis was hit with another 3 for his exploits, resulting in an automatic ban.

McLaren’s upcoming MP4-12C supercar has attracted roughly 2700 expressions of interest from prospective buyers, enough to fill two years worth of production.

The Bugatti Veyron might be faster, the Pagani Zonda more eye-catching and the Ferrari Enzo more extravagant. Nevertheless, the McLaren F1 is still regarded by most enthusiasts as the greatest car ever made, bar none. The F1 was the physical manifestation of the dreams of Gordon Murray, a savant engineer whose personal quirks ingrained in the car’s design. There’s no radio, because Murray hated listening to the radio, but there’ is a top-notch hi-fi for your own music. The engine was a BMW V12 that had more in common with an F1 engine than the opulent 12-cylinders that powered the 750iL and 850i luxo-barges. The driver sat in the middle of the car, and the engine was lined with gold, for better heat dissipation.

Even after the legendary McLaren F1 was out of production, McLaren maintained a single showroom on London’s Park Lane. The location was hardly a showroom at all, with a single McLaren F1 located behind a window that faced onto the busy thoroughfare, so passerby’s could gawk in wonderment at the million dollar machine.

With McLaren’s MP4-12C set to launch as a much more accesible vehicle (in relative terms), McLaren found itself in need of a distribution channel, and has been courting a potential sales force for nearly a year. Now, they’ve finally announced where they’ll be slinging their supercars. North America will get 10 outlets, with Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Orange County, Miami, New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Tampa as the U.S. locations, and Toronto as the sole Canadian outlet. Elsewhere, familiar hotspots like Paris, Dubai, Tokyo, London and Milan will get showrooms, as will other financial and cultural capitals scattered around the world. McLaren expects to produce 1,000 cars per year, but has already received pre-orders for over twice that number.

[Source:   TopSpeed]

Hit the jump to read McLaren’s official press release