Jaguar Land Rover is looking for a modular platform for electric cars. It looks to other manufacturers for this, because developing it completely itself would not be fast enough and would not be profitable.
A somewhat remarkable statement is made by CEO Thierry Bollore. The JLR CEO indicates that his group is ‘still looking for a partner’ to prepare an EV platform for its models, while it was recently announced that Jaguar will only be selling electric models from 2025. Jaguar is coming with a fully electric model line on a platform specially intended for BEVs, but that platform apparently does not exist yet. Bollore speaks according to Automotive News already of a ‘clear attraction to work with us’.
So there’s work to be done for JLR. The group would have rejected the idea of ​​developing such a platform all by itself, because that would be too expensive due to its sales volume. It would also take too long. If we look at parent company Tata Motors, it is not just possible to borrow such a platform from a sister brand. There is Tata Technologies Limited, which develops technologies for Ford, General Motors, Honda, and Toyota, among others. Perhaps something is possible from those tires, although in that case it will only be possible to gain something from GM with Ultium. The other three parties do not yet have a modular EV platform that can be deployed on a large scale.
If we look at other companies, Hyundai, Volkswagen and Geely in particular are already far in the electrical field. Making its E-GMP platform available can be of particular interest to Hyundai. After all, that has little competition to fear from JLR. At most with Genesis. At Volkswagen, JLR is probably more in the same vein, with brands such as Audi and possibly also Bentley, at Geely that is the case with Volvo. Then there is Mercedes-Benz, with the platform for the EQ models, but that brand would also split in the stomach with Jaguar being a stronger direct competitor. In any case, Bollore says that there are ‘multiple options’ on the table. Undoubtedly already concrete enough; after all, the promise for 2025 is already very concrete and will only be four years away.