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Tata Motors-owned Jaguar Land Rover on Monday confirmed fresh investment of £355 million (about Rs 2,655 crore) in a new facility to manufacture advanced technology, low-emission engines in the United Kingdom.
The new engine facility will be built at i54 South Staffordshire, a business park near Wolverhampton in the UK’s Midlands.
“As part of our long-term strategy for the JLR business, we will design, engineer and manufacture a new family of advanced engines. This is a major commitment for our company and we will produce these advanced, highly-efficient engines for future Jaguar and Land Rover models at a new facility in the UK,” Chief Executive Officer Ralf Speth said.
This will be part of JLR’s plans to invest £1.5 billion a year for the next five years. “As we invest £1.5 billion a year for the next five years on new product developments, expanding our engine range will help us realise the full global potential of the Jaguar and Land Rover brands. The all-new family of four-cylinder engines will increase JLR’s capability to offer high-performance engines with class-leading levels of refinement, whilst ensuring continued significant reductions in vehicle emissions,” Speth added.
The UK government said it would support JLR’s project through the Grant for Business Investment scheme which provides up to £10 million (Rs 75 crore).
The engine manufacturing facility was expected to create up to 750 highly-skilled engineering and manufacturing posts at JLR, along with thousands more of highly-skilled manufacturing jobs in the supply chain, the company said.
JLR’s engines are currently supplied by its former owner Ford from its plants in Bridgend and Dagenham.
JLR had reported pre-tax profits of £1.1 billion in the financial year ended March 31, up from £14.6 million the previous year. Revenue during the period was up by 51 per cent to £9.9 billion
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