Tata Motors’ Jaguar Land Rover’s (JLR) 70 year old plant at Solihull in the British Midlands has been given a new lease of life with the addition of the Jaguar XE to the factory that began with, and, until now, had only produced Land Rovers.
Jaguars for years were built at nearby Browns Lane, Coventry (with some local assembly overseas) before being consolidated between Castle Bromwich and Halewood during the 2000s.
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The XE is built at a new GBP500m (US$750m) ‘factory within a factory’, and its production, the culmination of more than GBP2bn ($3bn)of product, infrastructure and technology investment, is important for the British automotive supply chain thanks to an additional GBP4bn ($6bn) worth of contracts committed to 55 UK based suppliers who will provide 55% of the components.
One of them, Rosti McKechnie,a Yorkshire based plastics specialist, has been awarded a GBP75m ($110m) contract for the XE. The company took advantage of opportunities presented by the growing UK automotive industry to installing new robotic machinery after a spend of GBP18m ($27m) by its new Swedish owners. Its workforce has doubled and is set to grow further in support of the new JLR contract.
Rugby based Automotive Insulations, which manufactures thermal and acoustic insulation, has invested in a new 65,000 sq ft factory to accommodate its expanding workforce to supply the XE while Birmingham based Sertec Group has spent GBP15m ($22m) on new presses, robotics and site upgrades, primarily at its Tyseley plant. This has led to the creation of 107 new jobs.
The introduction of the XE at Solihull required a new body shop plus additional trim and final assembly facilities – the largest single spend on the plant in its seven decade history. The start of production is the first step in making the site a dual brand manufacturing operation.
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By GlobalDataEarlier this year, the company confirmed its planned Jaguar performance crossover, the F-Pace, would also be built at the site.
