How Jaguar’s Range Rover is propping up India’s automotive giant Tata Motors
It has been nearly two decades since the Indian automotive giant Tata Motors bought Jaguar Land Rover from Ford in a $2.3bn (£1.82bn) deal.
The acquisition breathed new life into JLR, which had struggled to make headroads into the luxury market.
Now the purchase is driving India’s largest carmaker’s share price to new levels, amid soaring demand for Jaguar’s iconic Range Rovers.
Shares in Tata Motors, a subsidiary of the Tata Group conglomerate led by Natarajan Chandrasekaran, rose eight per cent to an all-time high on Monday.
Behind the rise was a record performance from Jaguar Land Rover. The British subsidiary reported its best quarterly profit (£627m) in seven years last Friday after orders for its SUVs surged.
Its Range Rover models, often used by celebrities and politicians and costing between £40,080 and £273,000, have become a staple of JLR and are highly profitable.
Revenues sat at a record £21.1bn for the first nine months of its financial year, driven by a 22 per cent rise in sales of modern luxury vehicles and record Range Rover wholesales. JLR, which accounts for two thirds of Tata Motor’s total sales figure, also maintained its margin guidance of 10 per cent for 2026.
Boosted by resurgent output from the Coventry-headquartered firm, Tata has been able to avoid the brunt of an aggressive price wars between global automakers.
And now its utilising JLR’s push into the electric market to keep pace in the global battle for electric vehicle (EV) market share.
JLR’s chief executive Adrian Mardell said on Friday the firm had already seen “strong client interest” for its soon to launch Range Rover Electric. In fact, demand is some of the highest in the company’s 53-year history, with 16,000 sign ups to the waiting list since opening.
Analysts from Motilal Oswal expect overall demand in the US and Europe to remain stable, while not seeing “any change in the pace of EV penetration.”
The only headwind on the horizon is whether the luxury segment begins to take a hit from broader macroeconomic challenges. HSIE Research expects some “demand uncertainty” in key regions, although 2024 will still be an “operationally strong year.”