Group Lotus PLC, the National Skills Academy for Manufacturing, City College Norwich and the Learning and Skills Council’s Train to Gain service have joined forces to provide a Level 2 NVQ training course in Business Improvement Techniques (B-IT).

The course is taught internally by Lotus employees, all of whom are qualified to the required standards.

Since the initiative was launched earlier this year, the company has received more than 280 enrolment requests, and the first 150 of these have completed their classroom training.

The company has set a goal of achieving 300 City and Guilds NVQ Level 2 certificates by July 2008.

Last week, Group Lotus CEO Mike Kimberley presented certificates to the first 17 employees to complete the course.

“Improvements in performance and quality will directly benefit the production of our multi-award winning sports cars currently in production, our future models and our high technology client vehicles that we manufacture,” he said.