Corporate Business

MG Motor UK’s family-friendly SUV, the MG GS, has been announced as the company’s fastest-ever selling vehicle. Launched at The London Motor Show in May 2016, the model has already surpassed 500 unit sales in just 176 days. Reaching the milestone faster than any other of the manufacturer’s vehicles, even its stylish supermini, the MG3; success of the MG GS demonstrates market demand for a fun, family-friendly SUV – available at a sensible price.

McLaren Automotive has today celebrated the manufacture of its 10,000th car from the McLaren Production Centre in Woking, England. The 10,000th car, a McLaren 570S finished in Ceramic Grey paintwork from the McLaren Special Operations ‘Defined’ palette, rolled out of the Production Centre just over five years after the first car, a McLaren 12C, was completed.

Phase I of Aston Martin’s new manufacturing facility at St Athan in Wales received the green light when Aston Martin President and CEO Dr Andy Palmer met Welsh First Minister, Rt Hon Carwyn Jones AM to finalize the sale of the St Athan site to the British luxury carmaker. In February 2016, Aston Martin announced that it had chosen St Athan from 20 potential global locations as its second manufacturing facility as part of a £200M investment in new products and facilities. A recruitment drive this summer began the search for up to 750 new Aston Martin employees who will work at the new facility, a number of whom have already begun their training, building the new DB11 at its Gaydon Headquarters.

The UK’s leading manufacturer of premium luxury vehicles has announced further global sales growth for November 2016, following a successful month in China and last week’s announcement that its Chinese plant is increasing capacity by over 50%. November % increase(decrease) YOY Jan – November % increase YOY 15/16 Financial Year % increase YOY Jaguar Land Rover 47,588 2 527,937 21 521,571 13 Jaguar 14,613 83 132,381 75 94,449 23 Land Rover 32,975 (14) 395,556 9 427,122 11 Jaguar Land Rover today reported its best ever November retail sales of 47,588 vehicles, up 2% compared to November 2015. The year-on-year growth in retail volumes was driven by strong sales of the new Jaguar XF (with the addition of the long wheel base XFL in China) and F-PACE as well as continuing solid sales of the Land Rover Discovery Sport and Range […]

Birmingham-based SAIC Motor UK Technical Centre (SMTC UK), the sister company of MG Motor UK, has launched its 2017 internship program, in a search for the engineering talent of tomorrow. Having selected seven aspiring engineering graduates in September 2016 to the year-long internship program, the company is now on the hunt for its class of 2017. Commencing in September next year, the course covers a diverse range of topics including electronic engineering, powertrain, advanced engineering, body structures, vehicle performance, chassis engineering and vehicle styling. Team working is a key part of the program, which kicked off in 2016 with an outward bound event in the first week to help fast track graduates’ relationships with fellow students and learn about successful teams.

The three millionth Oxford-built MINI is a John Cooper Works Clubman – the first model to combine the latest John Cooper Works performance enhancements and a new ALL4 all-wheel drive system. Plant Oxford has celebrated the three millionth MINI to roll off the assembly line since production began back in 2001. From around 300 cars a day in 2001 to around 1,000 built to order cars today, the 4,500 strong workforce at Oxford produce one new MINI almost every minute. Around 80 per cent of MINIs built here are exported to more than 110 markets across the world.

In an open letter published in the Financial Times on 18 February 2015, Rolls-Royce undertook to regularly inform its stakeholders about the progress of Project Cullinan. Continuing this dialogue, which has seen twice-yearly updates, Rolls-Royce today publishes photographs depicting the latest key milestone in the development programme of this new ‘all-terrain, high-sided vehicle’. This first full development vehicle will begin testing in public from tomorrow. The world’s leading luxury goods brand has regularly informed its patrons about this painstaking development programme. Advocates of the marque have been shown the first engineering mule built for the development of the new all-wheel drive suspension system, as well as those created to test the all-new aluminium architecture that will underpin all Rolls-Royces from 2018 onwards. This latest development vehicle will travel to numerous locations around the world in a challenging testing programme to […]

Aston Martin has appointed Maximilian Szwaj as its new Vice President and Chief Technical Officer. In this executive role, Max will be responsible for Aston Martin’s global engineering operations and will report directly to President and Chief Executive Officer Dr Andy Palmer and be based at the company’s headquarters at Gaydon, Warwickshire. Commenting on the new appointment: Andy Palmer said, “I am delighted to welcome Max to the Aston Martin team. Max has a wealth of experience across Engineering and Product Delivery, his experience, skills and passion will make him a great leader for the Engineering team as we prepare the business for the next generation of Aston Martin products.” On his appointment, Max Szwaj said: “I’m delighted to be joining Aston Martin at what is an exciting time for the brand. “The company is at a significant point in […]

For students of the history of Jaguar Cars, a book written by Chris Cowin, first 2012 and republished 2014 may be of interest. The book, British Leyland: Chronicle of a Car Crash 1968-1978 is simply packed with interesting history. This is the comprehensive story of a collection of once great and diverse British industries, primarily automotive, and their slow but relentless move toward destruction with only a few surviving pieces, Jaguar and Land Rover. For Jaguar only followers much of this book may be irrelevant as it deals in great detail about the downward spiral of the largest indigenous British car companies beginning about 1968 but this date is approximate.

McLaren Automotive has awarded its first international internship to a student from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. Following in the footsteps of the McLaren founder, Bruce McLaren, Andrew McLaren (no relation), a third-year student in the Faculty of Engineering studying Mechatronics Engineering, will spend nine weeks at the McLaren Technology Centre in Woking, working alongside the company’s Research and Development engineers. Nearly 60 years beforehand, the McLaren founder, Bruce McLaren, travelled to England on a similar ‘Driver to Europe’ scholarship to pursue his motorsport aspirations and founded his own racing company in 1963. Born in Auckland, New Zealand, Bruce McLaren studied at the Auckland University of Technology and was an accomplished engineer and innovator as well as a successful racing driver.

Five exclusive Design Editions of the multi-award winning McLaren 570S are announced today, taking the popular ‘By McLaren’ personalisation themes a stage further with combinations of color, trim, and finish that are guaranteed to showcase the Sports Series coupe at its stunning best. The Design Editions have been painstakingly created by the people who know McLaren’s array of personalisation options the best – McLaren’s own designers.

The Jaguar I-PACE Concept car is the start of a new era for Jaguar.  This is a production preview of the Jaguar I-PACE, which will be revealed next year and on the road in 2018. Jaguar’s engineering and design teams have torn up the rule book to create a bespoke electric architecture, matched with dramatic design. The result is a no-compromise smart, five seat sports car and a performance SUV in one.

Briggs Automotive Company (BAC) landed two prestigious awards at the Northern Automotive Alliance (NAA) Awards on 10 November in Manchester, seeing off stiff competition from high-profile companies from the region. BAC won the highly acclaimed International Trade Award as well as the Logistics Excellence Award to once again prove that it’s one of the most exciting and innovative businesses in the UK.

Congratulations to Mike Harvey who has been awarded the Pre-War Car Michael Sedgwick Award 2016 for his publication ‘Skinners Union – A History of the skinner family and S.U Company‘. The award, that takes the form of a plaque and £250 given by the Michael Sedgwick Memorial Trust, hopes to ‘encourage new research into motoring history and to make the finding available to the public’. The winner has to demonstrate excellence in research, presentation, readability and novelty, that will materially further our understanding of the subject. A short list of nominated books were assessed by a panel of judges, who are themselves respected authors and highly knowledgeable enthusiasts. The panel was headed by chairman Guy Loveridge, motoring author and broadcaster and Deputy Chairman of the Guild of Motoring Writers. ‘Skinner’s Union – A history of the Skinner family and the […]

Chinese-Thai joint venture SAIC Motor-CP, which produces and markets MG cars in Thailand, has broken ground on its second assembly plant in the Kingdom, the Bangkok Post reports. The factory is located at the Hemaraj Eastern Seaboard Industrial Estate 2 in Chon Buri province. In May, the company announced plans to build a second 700,000 sqm plant that will handle MG vehicle production processes such as body assembly, vehicle assembly, and painting under one roof. The total investment in this second plant was not disclosed, but the report estimates around 30 to 40 billion baht.

Speeds of 96mph, 75 percent gradients and a 7,119 ft. descent, the Range Rover Sport has conquered it all on an Alpine ski course that has been the downfall of many skiers (1). The Range Rover Sport is the first-ever production vehicle to attempt the fearsome ski run. Piloted by renowned race and stunt driver Ben Collins, the all-terrain super-SUV tackled the treacherous terrain on the 9.25 mile downhill route at Mürren in Switzerland, completing it in 21min 36sec. During the 7,119 ft descent, the Range Rover Sport followed the route used by skiers on the tough Inferno Mürren, one of the oldest and most challenging downhill races. It tackled snow, ice, loose rock, mud, broken asphalt, grass and gravel, helped by Land Rover Terrain Response ® technology (2). Introduced in 2013, Range Rover Sport is a genuine Land Rover […]

Jaguar has picked up two Scottish Car of the Year Awards, with the F-PACE named ‘SUV of the Year’ and the XF crowned ‘Luxury Car of the Year’. The accolades mark a decade of success for Jaguar at the annual awards, with the brand collecting 15 wins since 2006, and every new Jaguar winning an award since 1999. These awards are the latest in a line of major UK industry honours for the XF and F-PACE, with the British-built saloon having won seven accolades since its launch just over a year ago, and the F-PACE named Auto Express ‘Car of the Year’ and ‘Best Premium SUV’ by Telegraph Cars since its April introduction.

Strong sales across Europe helped Jaguar Land Rover achieve its strongest global October sales to date, selling 46,325 vehicles, up 12% year on year. The month’s performance was driven by improved sales of the Land Rover Discovery Sport, the Range Rover Evoque and the Jaguar F-PACE. Jaguar Land Rover sold 480,349 vehicles in the first ten months of 2016, up 23% on the same period in the prior year. Jaguar Land Rover delivered solid retail sales growth across all key regions year on year: Europe up 33%, China up 29%, North America up 25%, UK up 22% and other overseas markets up 4%.