actually, pacific merged with dying team lotus in 1995.
Pacific were initially referred to as Pacific Team Lotus and their car featured a green stripe with the Lotus logo.
so yes, it could be said, that pacific, even though they fumbled, are in fact, the true and real remains of what used to be the original Team Lotus - even though the pacific team doesn't exist either anymore, so essentially, non-existant.
the sad thing is that the lotus f1 team running today has nothing to do with the real team lotus.
Lotus F1 team is basically nothing more then Toleman>Benneton>RenaultF1 and quite frankly, the Genii F1 team.
The only lotus link is they have a branding partner in Group Lotus, which owns Lotus Cars [owned by proton], which originally was the business venture of Colin Chapman for car sales, and thus was NOT the real Team Lotus F1 outfit.
Caterham however, might be concidered to be the more 'genuine' Lotus outfit. Originally named as Lotus Racing formed by 1Malaysia, it had Proton's permission to use the Lotus name [Proton being the owner of Lotus Cars]. The Lotus racing team
was formed after intent of the Litespeed F3 team which was to enter F1 with Team Lotus name, in collaboration with Mike Gascoyne, but was denied an grid entry. Lotus Racing would officially enter the 2011 f1 season as TEAM LOTUS, having bought the rights to the company Team Lotus Ventures Ltd in ownership of David Hunt [nephew of] since the 1994 fumbling of Team Lotus. So in the end, in essence, Caterham F1, REALLY is the REAL and true TEAM LOTUS since tony fernandes bought the company, and NOT the Lotus F1 team.
the only reason Tony Fernandes isn't using the name anymore, is because of the wishes of the family members of Colin Chapman which preffered the name not be used.
It's really sad actually, because truth be that Tony Fernandes' 1Malaysia business group really are the ones who brought lotus back into F1, in collaboration with the lotus cars owner proton. Unfortunately, Dany Bahar seems to be involved to be the driving force bringing in a dispute between LotusCars [back then Bahar was CEO there] and 1Malaysia [Team Lotus]. A year ago however, Dany Bahar was fired of LotusCars supposedly over improper and unapproved business spendings.
It was Actually Tony Fernandes who wanted to run Gold-Black JPSreminiscent livery for the 2011 Team Lotus outfit.
However, DanyBahar's Lotuscars joined forces with Genii [that 'bought' Renualt F1 team], and became title sponsor for Genii F1 team. They chose to go for a black-and-gold livery [how original!]. Resulting in 2 Lotus teams. essentially the 'real' Team Lotus outfit and the Lotus cars outfit.
Over 2011 various court battles were fought in the end resulting Tony Fernandes could maintain his Team Lotus name.
So in essence, that means the caterham team was and is the real Team Lotus.
The team only was baptised into Caterham F1 team because of wishes of the Chapman family not to use the name,
and the intent of Tony Fernandes to run a business and because of that bought Caterham cars.
So the sad part of the story is, that, the real and true original people intending to 'revive' Team Lotus was Litespeed F3 team, paired with mike gascoyne, paired with Tony Fernandez, they managed to do just that - but because of the likes of Dany Bahar, whom now is fired, Team Lotus doesn't exist either way but is running as Caterham cars, while the team carrying the Lotus F1 name ,really isn't lotus F1, but Proton Genii F1 Team. figure that!
perhaps thus, in a way, you could say, since pacific merged with Team Lotus, and Tony Fernandes has bought Team Lotus in 2011 and the F1 team was baptised into CaterhamF1,
CaterhamF1, is in a sence the Pacific F1 team.
