British sports car->ke506 company Lister has been around for six decades, but has always been considered a sort of fringe operation. To change that, the company has announced plans to launch an all-new hypercar that will challenge the likes of the McLaren P1,->ke4608 Ferrari LaFerrari->ke4626 and Pagani Huayra. ->ke3763

Auto Express recently spoke with Lister Cars managing director Lawrence Whittaker, who confirmed the new car would be powered by a massive. 7.8-liter V-12. No complex hybrid->ke147 assistance here; just a supercharger that helps take power to 1,000 horsepower and drives the top speed up to 250 mph. Lister plans to build both the car and engine entirely on its own. A price tag of £2 million ($3.2 million) is estimated.

“We are not interested in building the fastest car we can, but one that puts the Lister name in the forefront of people’s minds with a world-beating product,” Whittaker told Auto Express.

Click past the jump to read more about the future Lister supercar.

Why It Matters

Lister has history that reaches all the way back to 1954. For most of that time, it was a race car->ke148 specialist working mostly with Jaguar running gear. In 1986 the company built its first road-going car, a heavily modified version of the Jaguar XJS->ke1206 powered by a 7.0-liter, Jaguar V-12 with over 600 horsepower and capable of hitting over 200 mph.

The relative success of the Lister XJS led to the development of the company’s first ground-up supercar,->ke177 the Lister Storm. The Storm was powered by the same V-12 as the Lister XJS and saw a good bit of success in sports car racing, but only four road-going examples were ever produced.

More recently, the Lister name was re-launched about a year ago after the consolidation of three different companies using the Lister name. Since then, the company has started building new versions of the Lister “Kobbly” -- one of the company’s race cars from the 1950s -- and has so far sold nine examples.

Now, Lister is looking to ride this new wave and is seeking investors to help jump start development of the new hypercar at its new factory in Cambridge, England. It’s hard to take announcements like this seriously, especially when the company is looking for funding, but this one might be worth keeping an eye. Lister has a collective knowledge that reaches back 60 years, and honestly, you can never have enough supercars in the world.

Competitors

Ferrari LaFerrari

The LaFerrari is the latest in a lineage of Ferrari flagships that include the F40, F50 and Enzo. Like the Lister, it’s powered by a big 6.3-liter V-12 that puts down 800 horsepower. A 163 horsepower electric motor brings that total to 963 horsepower, and makes the LaFerrari the first hybrid Ferrari. The sprint to 60 mph takes less than three seconds, and 120 mph comes in scarcely believable seven seconds. Top speed is 217 mph.

Asking price is around $2 million, but even if you have the scratch, you’re too late. All 499 LaFerraris were sold out before anyone outside of Ferrari even saw one, though a track-only XX version is on the way. To my eyes, at least, it’s also the best looking of the current crop of hyper cars.

McLaren P1

The other car any burgeoning hypercar builder will have to beat is the McLaren P1. This British-built land-based spacecraft is the successor to the legendary McLaren F1, which is still considered one the greatest cars ever built. Luckily, the P1 lives up to its forbearer. Like the LaFerrari, it’s a hybrid, but instead of a V-12, it uses a McLaren’s own twin-turbo V-8.

Active aerodynamics help keep the P1 shiny side up, and a race mode essentially turns it into a race car with the press of a button. At $1.15 million it’s a relative bargain in this company, but it too is sold out. Though, like the Ferrari, there’s also a track-only P1 GTR on the way.

Pagani Huayra

The Pagani Huayra feels a bit old-school in this company, but that’s part of its appeal. It was built as a replacement for the Pagani Zonda, but since Pagani can’t seem to stop building Zondas, both are built side-by-side at the company’s small factory near Modena, Italy.

The Huayra uses a Mercedes-AMG-built, 6.0-liter, twin-turbo V-12 that cranks out 700 horsepower, which gives it performance to spare, but where the Huayra really stands apart from its peers is in the details. If Leonardo di Vinci were alive today, he might be working at Pagani. The interior looks like the Vatican museum, and though the exterior may not be to everyone’s liking, its aerodynamic efficiency allows a top speed of 230 mph. And, unlike the McLaren and the Ferrari, you can still buy one, though it will cost you around $1.6 million.