Corporate Business

Famous for the Interceptor muscle car, Jensen is back – and the GT will be its first new model in 2016. Legendary British maker Jensen has risen from the ashes and announced it’ll be building a new car to be launched next year, followed by a new Interceptor. A new company called the Jensen Group will launch the GT in 2016. It’ll be powered by a General Motors 665bhp 6.4-litre supercharged V8, and be based on a bespoke spaceframe chassis with the choice of six-speed manual or six-speed semi-automatic transmissions. The rear-wheel drive GT will come as a two-seater or as a 2+2, and promises a luxurious cabin, with leather and Alcantara trim. All cars will be built to order and cost in the region of £350,000. The GT will be built in collaboration with Jensen International Automotive (JIA) – […]

Exports of British car to China have increased fivefold since 2009, according to figures released today by a British industry body, driven by a demand for luxury brands such as Rolls-Royce and Jaguar. The number of cars manufactured in Britain and exported to China stood at 137,410 in 2014, a 14.5 percent increase on the previous year and five times the number shifted in 2009, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) said in a statement. British car exports to all destinations have increased by 54 percent since 2009 to 1.2 million vehicles in 2014, and the sector represented 11.2 per cent of all British exports last year, a new record. The health of the British motor industry has not escaped the notice of Prime Minister David Cameron, who goes to the polls seeking re-election on May 7 and […]

According to Car & Driver, Jaguar Land Rover wants to colonize South Carolina, or at least a few hundred acres of it, for its first-ever U.S. factory. While nothing has been confirmed, Jaguar Land Rover is making headway in other markets as it seeks to grow annual worldwide sales to 750,000 by 2020, an increase of 76 percent over last year’s record sales of 425,006. On Tuesday, the first Chinese-built Range Rover Evoque came off the line in Changshu, which aims to produce up to 130,000 Evoque and Land Rover Freelander models annually. Back home, Queen Elizabeth II is scheduled to open a new plant for the company’s Ingenium engines near Wolverhampton next week. These additions come atop JLR’s smaller assembly plants in India, Kenya, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Turkey. Brazil is slated for 2016. Saudi Arabia is another possible locale. […]

In a press release, London Morgan announces the celebration of their first anniversary.   Symbolising the beginning of an exciting new chapter for Britain’s automotive legacy, London Morgan, the official London dealership of the country’s last independent family-owned car manufacturer, The Morgan Motor Company, is celebrating its first anniversary since opening its doors 12 months ago. Located in Astwood Mews in the heart of South Kensington, a cobbled oasis recently awarded honorary Garden Square status on account of its resident’s horticultural presentations, London Morgan launched in May 2013, neighbouring its sister company Monaco VW (incidentally, Britain’s oldest Volkswagen dealership established in 1948 by a Polish immigrant settling in London following WW11). Speaking about the establishment of London Morgan, Anthony Barrell, Dealer Principal of London Morgan says: “Since launching one year ago, we have had a phenomenal response from  customers across London, the UK and internationally. This is testament to an intense appetite for all […]

News Release From Jaguar Land Rover about the new, beyond drool-worthy, lightweight E-Type coupe. I don’t even want to begin to think about how much these are going to cost. Or how long the line will be to get one. Jaguar has revealed the prototype of its ‘new’ Lightweight E-type – a further six of which will be built and sold. Jaguar announced in May 2014 that it would recreate six new Lightweights, each built by Jaguar Heritage, part of Jaguar Land Rover’s new Special Operations division. Each of the six cars will be built to a specification originated from the last Lightweight E-type produced in 1964 and will be hand-crafted at the original home of the E-type, Jaguar’s Browns Lane plant in Coventry, England. The cars will be sold as period competition vehicles and all will be suitable for […]

The week we have a video documentary which traces the rise and fall of a great British brand that is largely unknown in the US, Rover. And no, we don’t mean Range Rover. Well, not totally. In the days when Britain’s car industry was the envy of the world, Rover epitomized everything to which the driver of taste aspired, but in 2005 it reached the end of the road. The film explores how Rover cars went from defining their eras to becoming victims of their times, telling the story behind the key models to the controversial joint ventures with Japanese and Indian manufacturers in later years.

Aston Martin has confirmed that it is working on a new platform to replace its venerable VH design, which debuted in the first-generation Vanquish at the start of the century. The new platform will underpin the British automaker’s next generation of sports cars and will be designed to fit new V-8 engines sourced from Mercedes-AMG. They also announced their 2013 finance, and it was a very good year. For the 12-month period ending December 31, 2013, Aston Martin managed to sell approximately 4,200 cars worldwide, an increase of 11 percent on the previous year, and its profits came in at £84.8 million (approximately $142.6 million), up a substantial 22 percent on levels a year ago. For full coverage of these announcements, you can check out the article at Motor Authority  as well as hitting Aston Martin’s own news site.

According to IBT, a fleet of Routemaster buses built in the swinging 60s has been drafted back into service to save Londoners from the misery of the tube strike. Transport for London (TfL) has drafted in 40 of the vintage buses, which were manufactured between 1954 and 1968, after parts of the London Underground ground to a halt. Several of the buses were offered up by private tour operators, who bought them after they were taken out of service in 2005 and now use them to provide novel transport for weddings and other functions. Check out the more details on the strike and the vintage busses coming to the rescue at the International Business Times.

Stories come and theories go, but according to the website Complex Rides, this one seems to have some teeth to it. Could it be that Mercedes will soon be driving Aston Martin? And with companies like VW and BMW taking control of other prime British marques, who can say it isn’t a valid supposition? To quote CR, “It all started  when Aston Martin announced that it would be using engines co-developed with AMG, using a lot of AMG technology in its next generation of cars. When this happened, Mercedes got to take home a five percent non-voting stake in Aston Martin. More deals were later struck for use of Mercedes’ next gen SL and SLK platforms, as well as for the GL’s platform for the upcoming Lagonda SUV. That’s in addition to the whole suite of Mercedes electronics, from active […]

According to the Internet news site Digital Trends, the once famous name of Jensen may be returning to the car market. Their article begins this way, “Britain has no shortage of iconic car marques. From Aston Martin to Jaguar, and Rolls-Royce to Land Rover, Britannia rules the roads like it once ruled the waves. “Yet one name in the pantheon of great British carmakers often goes unnoticed: Jensen. Its signature product was the Interceptor, an Italian-styled GT with Chrysler V8 power known for being one of the first road cars with four-wheel drive (in FF form), and for having the coolest name ever applied to a fender badge. “Sadly, a combination of poor build equality, a general downturn, and myriad other factors forced Jensen to close its doors in 1976. There have been a few attempts to revive the company, […]

New car sales in Britain rallied in March to the highest total for a decade, industry data showed on Friday. Sales jumped 17.7 percent last month to 464,824 vehicles compared with data for March 2013, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) said in a statement. That was the highest monthly figure since March 2004. “New car registrations surged 17.7 percent in March … a surprisingly strong level of growth and a reflection of intensifying consumer confidence and the availability of great new products,” said SMMT chief executive Mike Hawes. “Given the past six years of subdued economic performance across the UK, there is still a substantial margin of pent-up demand that is contributing to a strong new and used car market. There has never been a better time to buy a new car thanks to attractive finance deals […]

They don’t sell any MG in America, but some companies like to take their cars to Colorado anyway, to ensure they can handle high altitude conditions. Roman Mica from TFL Car is off doing what he calls “prototype fishing” again. This time, his catch and release program resulted in two MG5 hatchbacks spotted in Colorado. The MG5 Hatchback sounds like a nice British car, but it’s actually a Chinese car. It arrived in concept form in early 2011 and already has a mild facelift. We believe this particular prototype uses a turbo 1.5-liter engine rated at around 130 hp and 200 Nm of torque. The MG3 supermini and larger MG6 are sold in Europe, being assembled in Britain by very few employees, from complete kits made in China. What’s really funny about the video is that a single well spoken […]

British sports car maker Caterham is driving ahead with ambitious plans to conquer Asian markets, according to chief executive Tony Fernandes, who is also chairman of QPR. “We may be a small voice now, but we’re on our way to engineering a decent set of lungs,” he said at the Singapore Grand Prix, where the firm launched its first new ultra-performance model, the AeroSeven Concept. Caterham was bought two years ago by Mr Fernandes with business partner Kamarudin Meranun. They also founded the Tune Group, which opened its first hotel in Edinburgh this year. The pair founded budget airline AirAsia 12 years ago and said the experience would help the motor manufacturer gain a stronghold in the region. “We were told our plans for AirAsia could not work,” said Mr Fernandes. “Today, AirAsia has a growing fleet of more than […]

After a 25-year absence, one of the great names from British sports car manufacturing will return. Lister has announced its comeback to the British car industry after a 25-year absence, with immediate plans to re-introduced the famous Lister Cars is aLister ‘Knobbly’ Jaguar, raced by the likes of Sir Stirling Moss. British sports car manufacturer founded by George Lister in 1954 in Cambridge, England, which became known for its involvement in motorsport. Sold in 1986, Laurence Pearce produced variants of the Jaguar XJS before producing a bespoke sports car, the Lister Storm. Since May 2013 Lister Cars has been purchased by Warranty Wise Insurance Services T/A Warrantywise. Returning to its Cambridge roots, Lister plans to build a 21st century version identical to that of the 1958 race car. The original drawings and manufacturing jigs created by Brian Lister have all been re-commissioned and race proven Jaguar D-Type-specification engines […]

Britain is accelerating away from its European competitors in the car-making sector with investment flowing into the factories of Nissan and Jaguar Land Rover as Chinese and American demand drives sales. Jaguar Land Rover said on Tuesday it was pumping £1.5 billion (1.8 billion euros, $2.4 billion) into its plant in Solihull near Birmingham, creating 1,700 jobs and giving a welcome fillip to industrial central England. The Solihull plant will make new lightweight Jaguar and Land Rover models made of aluminium. In northeast England, Nissan has been granted permission to extend its already vast plant in Sunderland, securing jobs in an area where major employers are in short supply. The investment decision was announced at the Frankfurt Motor Show by JLR chief executive Ralf Speth, who said it was “further evidence of our commitment to advancing the capability of the UK […]

Accountants Deloitte were today punished with a record £14 million fine for failing to manage conflicts of interest over their advice to collapsed car maker MG Rover. The Financial Reporting Council also severely reprimanded the firm for its conduct over MG Rover, which crashed into administration in 2005 with debts of £1.4 billion and 6,000 job losses. Its damning report said: “These are all very serious matters. The public must be protected from misconduct of this nature.” Four MG Rover directors — the “Phoenix Four” — set up the Phoenix company to buy the loss-making British carmaker for a token £10 five years earlier. But Deloitte and its partner and corporate finance expert Maghsoud Einollahi — personally fined £250,000 and banned from the profession for three years — both failed to properly manage conflicts of interest, the FRC said. Einollahi […]

According to The Telegraph, Jaguar Land Rover is to create another 1,700 jobs at its Solihull factory in Birmingham to support a new range of sports and cross-over cars featuring the latest in lightweight aluminium technology. The UK-based car maker, owned by India’s Tata conglomerate, said it would invest £1.5bn to introduce new one-piece “aluminium vehicle architecture” into its range. Prime Minister David Cameron hailed the move as “fantastic news for Solihull and a huge vote of confidence in the UK. This investment will also deliver another 24,000 jobs in the supply chain – on top of the 1.3m the private sector has already created since 2010.” A Jaguar sports sedan, launched in 2015, will be the first to feature the new technology, as well as the first to use engines from the company’s new £500m engine plant in Wolverhampton. […]

It may seem like only yesterday when Mini entered the US to sell its cars, but it’s been 11 years since the car maker began selling its vehicles in the states. In that time frame, Mini has sold 500,000 of its cars in the US, marking a new milestone for the British car manufacturer, which is owned by BMW. Mini has increased its US sales from 24,590 units in 2002, to 66,123 units last year. The Mini Cooper has easily been one of the company’s most popular vehicles, but they also have a small selection of variations of the popular car, including the Hardtop, Clubman, Convertible, Countryman, Coupe, Roadster, and Paceman. As for Mini dealership around the US, there are currently 116 locations spilled out over the states, but the car maker plans for a total of around 130 locations […]