Proton, the Malaysian maker of sedans and taxis that bought control of Lotus in 1996, hasn’t made any profit from the British unit for 15 years and probably won’t at least until 2014. Now that Proton itself may be divested by its state-run parent, investors such as Gan Eng Peng say Lotus Group International Ltd. is ripe for a sale.

“It will make sense for them to sell it,” said Gan, who helps oversee about $3.6 billion as head of equities at HwangDBS Investment Management Bhd. in Kuala Lumpur. “Proton and Lotus are not a good fit. They are in different market segments, both in terms of geography and product.”

Lotus, which has struggled to compete against Porsche AG (PAH3) and Ferrari SpA in Europe, has hung on to relevance in the auto industry partly because of its decades-long expertise in designing lightweight frames. Still, the company may need the backing of a carmaker more global than Proton to survive in an industry where carmakers such as Saab Automobile are filing for bankruptcy, according to Gan.
Interest in Lotus

Lotus’s sale has been the subject of speculation before. Shanghai Automotive Industry Corp. this month denied an Edge newspaper report that said China’s largest carmaker is interested in Lotus. Two months ago, Proton denied a report by the Star newspaper that it was selling its Lotus stake to Luxembourg-based Genii Capital.

Lotus Chief Executive Officer Dany Taner Bahar, formerly a Ferrari executive, said he’s confident he can make the company break even by 2014 as long as he has the financial backing.

“The only thing we can do is show the current owners, or the new owners, that we are absolutely in line with the business plan that we have presented,” Bahar, who’s based in Norfolk, U.K., said in an interview last week. “Without the funding support and the guarantees given by the Proton group, we would not survive, end of story.”

Bahar said Lotus, whose cars were featured in the James Bond movies “The Spy Who Loved Me” in 1977 and “For Your Eyes Only” in 1981, will continue to turn to its engineering strengths to stay competitive.