McLaren is firmly sticking its boot into the supercar market with plans to produce several model ranges from its Woking base in the coming years.

Today it launched its "affordable supercar", the MP4-12C, which will be compete with supercars in the £125,00-£175,000 bracket.

It is powered by a 3.8-litre V8 with twin turbos, which McLaren claims develops 600bhp and will speed the two-seater from 0 to 60mpg in 3.4 seconds.

The car will go on sale in 2011. McLaren expects to build 1,000 per year.

However, the company aims to increase total production from Woking to around 4,000 within three years through launching other sports cars.

McLaren Automotive chairman Ron Dennis said: "It is a long-held dream of mine to launch a range of high performance sports cars that set new standards in the industry.

"I am confident that now is the right time for McLaren Automotive to become a full-line high performance sports car manufacturer.

 He added: "This is the start of an exciting new chapter in McLaren's history, in British high technology engineering and manufacturing, and in global sports car design. We aim to be the best."

McLaren's international sales and marketing director is Rob Lindley, former managing director of Mazda UK.

The new McLaren aims to take on key rivals including the new Ferrari 458, Lamborghini Gallardo, Porsche 911 Turbo, Bentley Continental GT and Aston Martin DB9.