Jaguar Land Rover has seen a notable turnaround in fortunes ever since it was taken over by Tata Motors 7 years ago and has gone on to become a leading brand in the UK. JLR built 489,923 cars in the UK in 2015, beating industry leader Nissan which produced 476,589 units during the year.
Produced from three manufacturing plants in Solihull, Birmingham and Halewood towards the north of England, Jaguar Land Rover now accounts for over half of Tata Motors sales.
This is a huge achievement for the luxury brand as their sales comprise of passenger cars in the luxury segment, while Tata Motors caters to the entry to mid level car buyers. Another interesting fact to note here is that JLR sales are not just higher than that of Tata’s passenger car sales, but that of their combined vehicle sales. Over the last two quarters, JLR has posted higher sales than that of Tata Motors.
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Tata Motors, India’s top automaker by revenue confirmed strong demand for the entry level luxury cars – Jaguar XE and the Discovery Sport. These two models pushed up sales by 28% to 158,813 units in the fiscal fourth quarter ended Mary 31, 2016. Sales in China increased 19% after dropping 10% last quarter while JLR sales rose 29% across markets from 28% in UK to 23% in North America and 54% in Europe.
Net profits of the Tata Motors Group increased three fold from INR 1,717 crores in the March 2015 quarter to INR 5,177 crores in the same period in 2016. Profits of JLR soared to 472 million pounds from 302 million pounds a year ago with increased demand noted from markets of Europe, China and the US.