Land Rover and Jaguar to Be Localized in China

According to foreign media’s report, India-based Tata Motors Ltd. plans to build a plant in China to produce Jaguar and Land Rover SUVs, with the purpose of spreading its high-end products into the emerging market.

In a May 28 press conference in London Tata’s executive president Carl-peter Forster said that the company would produce Land Rover and Jaguar vehicles in China. The company plans to increase the output of the two kinds of vehicles to 40,000 units, but did not release a detailed schedule in realizing this goal.

The Land Rover and Jaguar vehicles have to face the competition from BMW and Daimler in China. According to data from the Tata, about 208.2 thousand Land Rover and Jaguar vehicles were sold in the last financial year ending in March 2010, 8% of which were realized in China.

Forster said: “China is a market with promising development prospect. Apart from China, we need to develop the European, South African and South American markets. In truth, we have many markets with great potential.”

In 2008, Tata spent 2.5 billion US dollars acquiring the two brands of Land Rover and Jaguar from the US-based Ford Motor. In the last financial year, Tata saw the annual profit return due to the betterment of its sales of trucks and buses as well as the reduction in labor and production cost of Land Rover and Jaguar vehicles.

Tata plans to make Land Rover and Jaguar take more shares in the emerging markets by setting up more product exhibition institutions and founding sales companies in China. In the past ten months leading up to March 2010, 8,821 vehicles were sold in China. Forster said that Tata plans to choose its partner and site for its new plant in China in the next year or two years.

In addition, Forster said that Tata is going to turn one of its factories in Great Britain into a comprehensive manufacturing base. One of the two factories is located in Bromwich and is the manufacturing base of Jaguar XJ and XK vehicles. The Land Rover SUVs are produced in the plant in Sohihull.

Forster thought that a plant with higher efficiency has larger output than two smaller factories. Though the company plans to close some factories, it ultimate goal is to enlarge the production scale and so on.