RE: Jaguar goes Indian?

[sad61t]

Aditya said:

I live in India and am a hardcore Jaguar fan. <snip> Trust me on this, the current range of Jaguar cars is not admired here. Not many people understand the classic flowing lines of a car like the XJ saloon. People don't want to accept that underneath those classic looks lies a very hi-tech car. Tata has a lot of money. Let them pump it in and prop up Jaguar. Just leave the production to the Brits.

Which pretty much sums up Ford's mishandling of the Jaguar brand. They relied on a pipe & slippers image yet the 220 & E-types that defined the brand had cutting edge styling. Add Fiesta switch gear for that authentic US "lunchbox tactile" interior and the brand went down in every segment.

What rubs with me is that the concept cars were stunning, but the management just released the same shape again and again. I'm not a fan of the early BMW 'flame-effect' cars but they are maturing into a genuinely desirable product. Jaguar may have ruffled some feathers with a cutting edge design, but at least it would have been perceived as looking forward.

Just change "prop up" to "revitalise"!

Edited by sad61t on Thursday 19th July 17:43

[SS HSV]

Ring ring.. Ring ring..

Jaguar Call Centre said:

Hello please, this is Jaguar cars. How can we be helping you today?

Er, I'm interested in buying a new car

Jaguar Call Centre said:

One moment please, I am just accessing our system, it is being very slow today

Jaguar Call Centre said:

Hello please, what is it you say that you are wanting?

I am looking to buy a new car

Jaguar Call Centre said:

Hello please, Oh I see. Can you be telling me the model that is interesting you?

WTF? Sorry can you repeat that?

Jaguar Call Centre said:

Yes please, Is it the model that you are requiring to learn about or is it that you are wanting something from our department of many parts?

Sorry, you seem to have lost me there..

Jaguar Call Centre said:

Would you be liking me to call you back when it is convenient for you to be discussing the requirements with you?

Discuss the what Oh forget it

Jaguar Call Centre said:

Ok, I am being thanking you for your call. Is there being anything else I can be doing to help you please sir?

No click

[btom]

And the stereotypes carry on....

Anyone know what percentage of Pistonhead users read the Daily Mail?

[Triple7]

Agree about Jaguar design advancement. No doubt they are strapped for cash, or working on a very tight budget to preserve their cash reserves. But when MB are basing their new SL (Big XK rival) on this SLC concept, with rumoured up to 700BHP, the 420BHP XKR seems a tad out of date already? No matter Porsche was on it's knees less than 10 years ago, now they seem bullet proof. Remember form adversity comes great achievement!?



G

Edited by Triple7 on Thursday 19th July 18:01

[PPPPPP]

Goodness gracious me.

[GAGA]

Another great idea :
Why doesn't Jaguar just take the new XK and stretch the whole a car a little bit and add just two back doors and two decent single seats in the back....and presto you have a new Merc CLS and Aston Martin Rapide rival developed with just a small amount of money and a new addition to the Jaguar model line up...
And what about a XF-coupe ? or a XF convertible ? or even a XF estate/stationwagon ?


Here some nice photoshop works about potential new Jaguar models :

XJ-convertible:


XJ-coupe




XJ-estate


X-Type convertible

Edited by GAGA on Thursday 19th July 18:42

[Munter]

I do believe I hinted that Tata would look at LR/JAG when they were put up for sale. I dont believe anybody thought it was serious, but think about it and they were involved with Rover so have a taste of the UK car market and want to find the door in.

[derestrictor]

GAGA said:

Another great idea :

XJ-E

Bloody marvellous, I want it; where do you sign up?

[bencollins]

Could be an Indian takeaway, no that's ricist.

Seriously though India is on the up, Tata is obviously well managed, so can be good, how else did they build their pile of cash.

And if the Brits were as good at industry as we think we are, this situation wouldn't have arisen and 4 out of their 5 car range wouldnt look like 1950's tiled / chromed fireplaces selling at less than 100,000 PA.

Birmingham has a substantial ethnic Asian population so it all makes sense. As the joke goes, How do you tell a true brummy? A: Hes got a shamrock on his turban.

[DamonDash]

Fantic SuperT said:

I have ownder several Jaguars, and worked with numerous Indians. If you want Jags to become cheap shit this is the right direction to go in.

Hmm... this was my thought until i remembered, they are already there with the X type!

Another one of my thoughts was if they would be sending techs for training in Delhi as it might be better than Birmingham???

[Aditya]

While we are talking about takeovers, let me bring to your notice, that Bajaj, the Indian company which makes scooters, motorbikes and rickshaws, is trying to acquire a European marque. Likely targets are Ducati and Triumph.
http://lifeontwowheels-hawk.blogspot.com/2007/07/bajaj-ducati-ot-bajaj-triumph-which-one.html 

Edited by Aditya on Thursday 19th July 20:24

[Talksteer]

I don't see Tata buying Jag as being any better than a private equity company buying Jag with the possibility of being much worse.

The temptation would be to attempt to find synergy with Tata presumably by using Tata's India based opperation to secure low price parts and assemblies in India or for Jaguars engineers or technology to be used to develop cars to be produced in India.

I would suggest that both of these are not brilliant ideas, several of the modellers I work with have worked at Rover and they had plenty of tails of Rover sourcing parts from India or similar low price countries with tales of shoddy quality and deceitfulness. My own experience of trying to "out source" bread and butter engineering to India has been that it actually ends up taking more time to explain the problem/review the result than it would to do the task in house. Attempting to engineer components across time zones is always hard which is why the Japanese have generally either built cars in transplant factories where no design or engineering work is done locally or to outsource the entire development to Europe/US.

[MidnightDriver]

hmm the last car Tata exported to Britain was the Tata indica, you might remember it better as the city rover....i get the feelin if Tata buys Jag we'll be seeing a lot more re-polished turds of this ilk.

Edited by MidnightDriver on Thursday 19th July 23:29

[The Dodger]

derestrictor said:

I've had 2 (Jags, that is.) You?

Anyway, this is about national pride: I want my government to subsidise Browns Lane to the hilt using tax revenue previously bound for the Camden Town Honduran Peoples' Workshop Community Centre's production of 'Evita.'
......etc

Are you not aware they shut down production at Browns Lane ages ago?

(didn't read all this topic so sorry if already covered.)

[The Dodger]

GAGA said:

Another great idea :
Why doesn't Jaguar just take the new XK and stretch the whole a car a little bit and add just two back doors and two decent single seats in the back....and presto you have a new Merc CLS and Aston Martin Rapide rival developed with just a small amount of money and a new addition to the Jaguar model line up...
And what about a XF-coupe ? or a XF convertible ? or even a XF estate/stationwagon ?


Here some nice photoshop works about potential new Jaguar models :

XJ-coupe

...they've done that already. Never saw prod.

GAGA said:

XJ-estate

...they did this too. I believe there is one example on the road.

GAGA said:

X-Type convertible

....guess what? No they never made one but at the begining of the programme there was a convertible and a coupe. The 'vert was ditched in favour of the "F-Type" - which got canned.

[fatboy b]

pddmac said:

Jaguar lost their way. Pure and simple.

Not quite sir - more like they were led down the wrong way by the Ford management trying to make the brand into something it shouldn't be.

[covertjouster]

The only reason Indian and Chinese car firms are so succesfull is because they pay their workers far below what workers are paid in the Western world. This is simple maths. The only way Tata could make Jaguar work is by moving production to India like the Chinese did with Rover.

Tata's are cheap low tech cars. Not what Jaguar is about.

Merc are not a comparable product either. They are top end luxury cars. Jaguar were never about that and their recent lapse is simply a misunderstanding of the original brand. To my my mind most Mercs look like they've been left out in the sun too long and sagged and melted. They are characterless and in my experince of the only Merc I ever owned was the most unreliable car I've ever had.

All those old admired Jag.s were sleek, sexy, high performance, low cost. fighter planes for the road (polished ally and rivets). This is the core essence of what Jags should be now. The only one of those terms Tata would understand is low cost.

Hey one good thing tho. Everything is cyclical. India and China are growing so fast that it won't be that long before workers start striking for more money and then their industries will faulter and companies from other countries will start smugly poaching their industries.

[Fantic SuperT]

syko said:

It is sooooooo daft some of the wafer-thin dismissive and plainly xenophobic rants being made here. Some of the jokes are fine, but others (and it is plain to see which) are just the Ghost of Manning.

And some of them seem plainly fuelled by hatred of a non-white company owning Jaguar.

At the rate at which Indian companies as a whole are succeeding and American companies faltering, do you really think Tata will Jaguar up?

The Indians are arguably more sensitive to our culture than the Americans.
They certainly know how to do business. Big time.

They are not all wobbly-headed moustachios willing to do the three-bags-full-sir routine, ready to accept our little jokes about their accent and their food. The sooner we realise their benevolence to us, the better.

Our own home grown companies (private equity groups and investment banks amongst them) do a far better job of buying British companies, chopping them up, laying off the staff and then selling the equipment.I doubt Tata would do that.

Tata make vehicles. They make far more than Jaguar. They would probably manage it very well- which good business would want to screw up years of brand equity?


Rover had a choice to go to BMW or Honda. Their connection to Honda was far greater than with BMW. Then BMW royally screwed Rover and got rid. And kept the better brands for themselves. Honda were let down badly, and were bitter at the deal. Somehow, I genuinely think (IMO) that Hoda would have made a better go of Rover. But who wants a Kimosabe Hi-Karate Rover 75 chopsticks huh?

Edited by syko on Thursday 19th July 15:01

Perhaps travel narrows the mind in my case. Trying avoid generalising and stereotyping if I can, the Transparency International Global Corruption Index 2006 http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/survey...
places India 70th= (alongside Egypt, Peru, Burkina Fasu, China etc.) with a score of 3.3
The UK is rated 11th with a score of 8.6, USA 20th with 7.3. Finland was least corrupt at 9.6

While I concede Tata isn't necessary part of the corruption problem in India, it certainly seems to have thrived within it. It may have lofty goals, but on 12 July 2007 The Independent reported that Tata Chemicals plans to build a soda ash plant on the shores of Lake Natron, Tanzania. Such a development would destroy one of the few breeding grounds of the lesser flamingo.

Having paid £48,000 for a TVR Tuscan that unknowingly (to me) contained Indian-made finger followers of negligable quality, I would advise anyone expecting a quality product to avoid Indian manufacturing. If however, you want a whole car made like a TVR finger follower, go the Tata route.

[pddmac]

Strangely enough, I have high expectations should Tata manage to get hold of Jag.

Tata have more interests in the gloabal Automotive Engineering business than is widely known and are today working as consultants to most of the major OEM players, inc Honda, Ford, GM etc...

[bikemonster]

GAGA said:

I've got greeaaaat idea
UK has a population of 60209500 ! So if every human being from England, Wales, Scotland, Ireland and Northern Ireland put 100 pounds in the hat we would have 6 billion pounds to buy LR and Jag ! That's more than the asked 1,5 billion, which means enough cash in order to invest in the business (new models and to cover losses). If there's still enough money in the pocket : Buy LotusGroup and form the new company called LRJRLS(LandRoverJaguarLotus). Next step: kidnap Mr. Ulrich Bez and force him (with 10% stake of the company (means, he gets 10% of the company shares) or dozens of cash or a gun or a seductive lap-dance girl from Essex) to become new CEO of LRJRLS Ltd.
And I become a "SIR" for saving Britsh motor industry .... oh I forgot... I not a British civilian, so I can only call myself "GAGA, KBE" .... (SIR Gaga so much sounds better)

Great idea indeed, although one that has been tried in the past.

Last time 'round they called it Leyland, and how lovely an idea that turned out to be!

Sorry folks, but the British motor industry has been quietly consuming itself since at least the end of WW II, with inadequate product development and playing nearly-catch-up with its competitors.

(No, I am not a Britisher, but I do own 2 British cars, and have the oily driveway to prove it!)