Aston Martin won’t be the only luxury sports car manufacturer to offer a compact city car, if Lotus boss Danny Bahar gets his way. The company is looking to introduce a performance-oriented electric “supermini,” with power coming from either batteries or batteries plus a range-extending generator, and it will sell it for less than the gasoline-powered Cygnet.

Auto Express quotes Bahar as saying, “There’s no point in trying to fight the MINIs, and the small BMWs and Audis unless you have a special offering. Our car will be an EV or range extended EV and will offer performance of no other small car.”

Look for a less-well-equipped version of the car to come from Lotus’ parent, Proton. Just as the Aston Martin Cygnet is a rebadged and reworked Toyota IQ, the Lotus city car will be an extensively reworked Proton.

Expect the Lotus variant to offer both more content and luxury, as well as higher performance than the Proton version. Auto Express believes the Lotus city car will start at around 29,000 GBP ($45,179), which would make it some 2,000 GBP ($3,116) less expensive than an Aston Martin Cygnet.

The Cygnet remains available only in the UK and Europe, and that will likely be the case with the Proton-based Lotus as well. Superminis are a tough sell in the United States, especially when they’re priced as high as most entry-level luxury sedans.