Tata buys Jaguar Land Rover, appoints new CEO
3 Jun, 2008
7 Comments 
Tata buys Jaguar Land Rover, appoints new CEO
- David Twomey
It’s official, Indian business conglomerate Tata is now the owner of Jaguar and Land Rover, having handed over a staggering $US2.3 billion in cash to the Ford Motor Company at the company headquarters in Britian.
At the same time Tata has announced the official appointment of caretaker CEO, David Smith, who has been in the job since Australian Geoff Polites, who had been CEO under Ford and was expected to continue in the job, died suddenly in Australia last month.
Mr. Ratan N. Tata, Chairman of Tata Sons and Tata Motors, was present at the handing over ceremony at the head quarters of Jaguar Land Rover at Gaydon in the UK along with Mr. Don Leclair, the Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Ford Motor Company, and Mr. Lewis Booth, Executive Vice President of Ford Motor Company, who has responsibility for Ford of Europe, Volvo and Jaguar Land Rover.
Mr. Tata said, “This is a momentous time for all of us at Tata Motors. Jaguar and Land Rover are two iconic British brands with worldwide growth prospects. We are looking forward to extending our full support to the Jaguar Land Rover team to realise their competitive potential. Jaguar Land Rover will retain their distinctive identities and continue to pursue their respective business plans as before.
“We recognise the significant improvement in the performance of the two brands and look forward to this trend continuing in the coming years. It is our intention to work closely to support the Jaguar Land Rover team in building the success and pre-eminence of the two brands.”
Tata Motors also confirmed that Mr. David Smith, the acting Chief Executive Officer of Jaguar Land Rover, would be the new CEO of the business. Mr. Smith has 25 years of experience with Jaguar Land Rover and Ford.
Before recently returning to Jaguar Land Rover as its Chief Financial Officer, he was Director Finance and Business Strategy for PAG and Ford of Europe.
Mr. Smith said, “We are very pleased with the association with Tata Motors. We look forward to a sustained bright future for the company and its stakeholders.”
Jaguar Land Rover has been acquired at a cost of US$ 2.3 billion on a cash free, debt-free basis and Ford has contributed $US600 million towards pension costs of Jaguar Land Rover employees.
Long term agreements have been entered into for supply of engines, stampings and other components to Jaguar Land Rover.
Other areas of transition support from Ford include IT, accounting and access to test facilities. The two companies will continue to cooperate in areas such as design and development through sharing of platforms and joint development of hybrid technologies and power train engineering.
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June 3rd, 2008 at 10:46 am
ahh the irony of an Indian company buying out British marques. Did somebody say British East India Company?!
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June 3rd, 2008 at 11:43 am
That’s $2.3 billion which Ford will burn pretty quickly. If you leave that sort of money lying around it could get stolen. Better to lose it first.
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June 3rd, 2008 at 3:02 pm
it would be interesting to see how they change landrover…who are under heavy loss.
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June 3rd, 2008 at 6:21 pm
Good luck to them.
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June 3rd, 2008 at 7:59 pm
hang on. didnt they buy it ages ago?….did i travel back in time… oh SNAP IM GONA WIN 40 MILLION ON POWERBALL NOW!!
…. everyone… you wont belive this now. but the international space stations toilet will break!
…SERIOUSLY…. i wonder if jaguar/landrovers customer service gets better.. or worse?
cookie
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June 4th, 2008 at 4:40 pm
one thing for sure, LR and Jaguar need to try really hard to even survive no mather who is the “sugar daddy”. Except for those “loyal aging fans”, it needs to improve the damaged reliablity reputation, which alone will scare away all new gen potential buyers.
The reality is, LR refuse to sell/give extended warranty (after three years new car warranty)for both new and used cars. If it fears to lose money on warranty it’s own products, well, it speaks out itself!
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June 4th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
Jaguar have a history of modifying the car design (XJ40) to avoid being forced into releasing a product that they don’t like.
Unfortunately they didn’t manage that with the X-Type - perhaps their victory with the XJ40 was too well known - but the limited success of the X-Type as an affordable Jaguar may also prevent a repeat of the idiocy of basing a Jaguar on another’s platform.
At least for now, Tata are saying that “Jaguar Land Rover will retain their distinctive identities and continue to pursue their respective business plans as before”
I hope it stays that way.
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