The Financial Times reports that new Jaguar owners Tata Motors are taking the leaping cat up market. What's more, "there are no plans to replace Jaguar's cheapest model, the X-Type." Not so strangely, the once interim and now permanent CEO of Jaguar and Land-Rover is lifetime Ford financial guy (and ex-Aston director) David Smith. But while Smith may have tactical control, group chairman Ratan Tata is the man with the plan. Booming demand for conspicuous consumption by the newly wealthy in China, Russia and the Middle East has driven Bentley and Aston Martin sales of over $200k vehicles into the 10k unit per year range. Jaguar (and Land Rover) are already doing land office business in these expanding markets; Ratan wants a serious slice of that scrumptious pie. How exactly Land Rover fits into this new picture is a bit fuzzy, but taking Jaguar up against Bentley and Aston-Martin seems clear enough. The X-type is dead. Long live Jaguar.
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Cut off the very front end of the car and the X-type looks literally like a Kia Rio or something nasty. That car came from the same company that popped out the 1997-2006 XK8? :O Now, that was one HOT car.
It will probably work well for them. Unfortunately it means that the vast majority of people will never get to own a Jaguar.
I’ll make the prediction that in 15 years we’ll be pleading with Tata to import their awesome Chinese Jaguars and LRs to the U.S. Much like we do with Ford’s European designs currently.
Tata is based in India and I would be surprised to see them building Jags in China, but who knows. As to Ford, supposedly they are going to make an announcement this next Thursday about plans to bring more of their European designs over for mfg. in their No. American factories … you know, the ones who are busy not building trucks and SUVs.
The X-Type might be going?
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!
I love that car!
People who owned the X-type didn’t own a real Jag. Styling cues and some odd woody bits don’t add up to “Grace, Space, Pace”.
When I got a close look at a friend’s new X-type, it permanently changed my perception of Jaguar. For the worse. Besides Cimarron, its hard to remember a single model that so damaged a supposedly luxury brand as the X-type did for Jaguar, at least in my mind.
I want Ford to succeed, and I think that (unlike GM) they’re at least making a serious effort to turn things around in a miserable market. But wouldn’t it be a slap in Ford’s face for Tata of India to restore Jaguar to its former glory?
I’m fed up of people slagging the X-Type off! It is a wonderful car which IS a Jaguar as it hold to its brand values (i.e brilliant ride quality and style).
I own one and I love it. Stick your Mercedes-Benzes, Audis and BMW’s, I’ll have a Jaguar anytime!
Ford were useless managers of Jaguar. They positioned Jaguar not to encroach on Volvo (luxury cars, allegedly) and Aston Martin (Luxury sports cars). The 2 car segements which Jaguar is famous for! Why didn’t Ford market Volvo as a Euro-style car (which is what it was!) with safety in mind and leave Jaguar to deal with the luxury car market?
Utterly useless and I’m glad it’s gone to Tata and I hope they make a success of it just to show how pathetic Ford’s managers were.
TATA should be excused–since they have no such product–for keeping low-brow models like the X for entry-level forays in developing economies who might like TATA and Jaguar combined. It would appeal to the core buyers, and to Katie. :)
But, thank goodness, its nice to see the Indians know brand management better than Ford/PAG ever did.
Did they not just announce a new lower end ute?
Let’s see what they DO.