Jaguar Land Rover has announced a £15bn electric vehicle transformation plan that will see its Merseyside plant become an all-electric manufacturing site and more investment in its West Midlands sites.
JLR says its Reimagine strategy will help it to become “the world’s leading modern luxury car manufacturer”.
Its Halewood site in Merseyside will become all-electric, while its Engine Manufacturing Centre in Wolverhampton will become the group’s Electric Propulsion Manufacturing Centre.
JLR says its next medium-sized SUVs will be purely electric, with pre-order books to open for the first all-electric Range Rover later this year. That model will be built at Halewood, the group's first all-electric site.
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The group also says the first of three reimagined modern luxury electric Jaguars will be a four-door GT built in Solihull.
JLR says that vehicle will have a power output more than any previous Jaguar, a range of up to 700 kms (430 miles), and will be priced from £100,000. It will be built on its own unique architecture, named JEA, and more details will be released later this year, before the car goes on sale in selected markets in 2024, for client deliveries in 2025.
Chief executive Adrian Mardell said the Reimagine Strategy would help JLR towards becoming an electric-first, modern luxury carmaker by 2030. The group is also pushing towards its financial goals of achieving a net cash positive position by FY25 and double-digit EBIT by 2026.
Mr Mardell said: “Two years ago, we launched our Reimagine strategy and since then we have made great progress, including launching two new critically acclaimed modern luxury Range Rover and Range Rover Sport models, joining the Defender family, for which there is record demand.
“We achieved this while navigating the headwinds of the pandemic and chip shortages, and successfully ramping up production of our most profitable models to deliver profit in Q3.
“Today I am proud to announce we are accelerating our electrification path, making one of our UK plants and our next-generation medium-size luxury SUV architecture fully electric.
“This investment enables us to deliver our modern luxury electric future, developing new skills, and reaffirming our commitment to be net zero carbon by 2039.”
He added: “With Range Rover, the original luxury SUV, available for pre-order in pure electric form later this year, and the first of three breath-taking electric reimagined Jaguar models to be launched in 2025, we are stepping into an incredibly exciting new electric era for JLR as a modern luxury business.”
JLR’s chief creative officer, Professor Gerry McGovern OBE, said: “We have radically reimagined Jaguar as a modern luxury brand. The key to Jaguar’s transformation is that the designs convey that they are a copy of nothing.”
The company also says it is moving towards a “House of Brands” approach to promote its three world-famous names - Range Rover, Defender, Discovery and Jaguar - across the luxury car sector.
Prof McGovern said: “Pivotal to our Reimagine strategy is the formation of the House of Brands, which is a natural evolution, with a purpose of elevating and amplifying the uniqueness of our characterful British marques.
“Our ultimate ambition is to build truly emotionally engaging experiences for our clients that, overtime, will build long-term high equity for our brands and long-term sustainability for JLR.”
JLR’s Engine Manufacturing Centre in Wolverhampton currently produces Ingenium internal combustion engines for its vehicles. Renamed as the Electric Propulsion Manufacturing Centre, it will focus on producing electric drive units and battery packs for JLR’s next generation vehicles.
Meanwhile JLR’s Castle Bromwich site will provide body work for the group’s next generation electric vehicles. The company added: “ JLR continues to explore options for other parts of the Castle Bromwich site.”
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