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Jaguar Land Rover undergoes $3.2 billion turnaround plan as sales slump

MUMBAI — India's Tata Motors on Wednesday announced a turnaround plan for its luxury car unit Jaguar Land Rover, which has been hit hard by trade tensions between China and the U.S., low demand for diesel cars in Europe and worries over Brexit. Under "Project Charge," Tata Motors said it plans to cut costs and improve cash flows at Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) by 2.5 billion pounds ($3.2 billion) over 18 months. JLR also plans to launch several new vehicles, including the Jaguar I-Pace and the new Range Rover Defender over the next few years and will offer a hybrid or full-electric version of all its models by 2020. "Together with our ongoing product offensive and calibrated investment plans, these efforts will lay the foundations for long-term sustainable growth," JLR CEO Ralf Speth said after Tata Motors reported a quarterly loss. JLR has trimmed its pre-tax profit expectations for the current fiscal year ending March 31, 2019, and expects to break even, Speth said, versus an earlier target of profit growth. As part of the turnaround plan, JLR will first focus on cash-saving "quick wins" like reducing non-product investments and speeding up asset sales, Tata Motors said in an investor presentation. In the near term it will improve efficiency in areas including purchasing and material cost, manufacturing, logistics and people, and will focus on strategic and non-core asset sales. JLR has already reduced the number of production days at its UK plants in Castle Bromwich and Solihull. The company said in its presentation it has saved 300 million pounds since it initiated the turnaround plan six weeks ago and is working on 500 ideas for the future. Tata Motors reported a loss of 10.49 billion rupees ($141.9 million) for the July-September quarter, compared with a profit of 24.83 billion rupees in the year-ago period. That was worse than the estimate of a loss of 2.40 billion rupees, according to Refinitiv data. JLR reported a loss of 101 million pounds during the quarter and its margin on earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) fell 130 basis points to 9.9 percent. Retail sales of its Jaguar sedans and Land Rover sport utility vehicles (SUVs) fell 13.2 percent to about 130,000 units, hurt particularly by tariff changes in China and escalating trade tensions. Demand in China remained muted even after the country cut import tariffs for cars and car parts to 15 percent for most vehicles from 25 percent from July.

2019 BMW X7 vs luxury SUV rivals: Comparing specs and photos

Today we get our first-ever look at the first-ever 2019 BMW X7 crossover. We've actually already had our first-ever drive in an X7 Prototype. And so, we thought it appropriate to follow that up today with the first-ever X7 comparison of specs between BMW's first-ever three-row crossover with legitimate room for seven and its many high-dollar competitors. On paper, the 2019 X7 definitely seems to most closely align with the Mercedes-Benz GLS-Class. Their similar dimensions, interior space, engine choices and price would certainly imply where BMW placed the target when developing X7. We used those same elements to determine three-row vehicles likely to be cross-shopped or that should be cross-shopped. These include the Audi Q7, Land Rover Discovery, Volvo XC90 and Lincoln Navigator. Yes, the latter is a truck-based SUV as opposed to a crossover, but tell that to all the people lining out the door at the local Lincoln emporium. They do not care, and neither shall we. We also included the 2019 BMW X5, which was completely redesigned for this year and therefore not the first-ever. That makes it less appealing? Either way, lining the new X5 up with the SUV that leapfrogs it atop BMW's SUV hierarchy should provide a good idea of just how much more you get by going up a model number. Engines and model lineup Again, the X7 aligns closest with the GLS, offering a base six-cylinder in its xDrive40i model and an upgrade turbo V8 in the xDrive50i. The Mercedes engines have greater output, but the GLS still accelerates slower than the BMW. As the 2019 X5 offers the exact same engines, we would also expect the X7's fuel economy to be superior to the GLS once its estimates are announced. It should be noted, though, that the GLS offers a high-powered AMG model whereas we anticipate the X7 to offer a plug-in hybrid model comparable to the X5 upcoming xDrive45e model. The other luxury SUVs diverge in their engine choices and model lineup. The Audi Q7 offers a base turbocharged four-cylinder, as does the Volvo XC90 in its T5 model, which we left out of the above chart entirely for space reasons. That the Q7 3.0 TFSI supercharged V6 gets the same fuel economy estimates as the four-cylinder is proof positive that engine is purely around for its lower base price.

Jaguar Land Rover to cut $6.8 billion in costs

Jaguar Land Rover reduce costs by $6.8 billion and will push annual production volume to 1 million vehicles under a secret project called Leap 4.5, according to Reuters. The British automaker wants to achieve these ambitious goals by the end of the decade to compensate for the changing market in China and to counteract the price of meeting stricter emissions standards around the world. Leap 4.5 won't mean firing workers or cutting the automaker's $4.5 billion annual research budget. JLR will instead find savings by underpinning more models with modular platforms and by adjusting its supply chain. Future factories like the one in Brazil and the proposed plant in Slovakia also won't be affected by the new strategy. Globally, JLR continues to grow, and deliveries are up two percent through October 2015 to 390,965 vehicles. Business just last month was up 24 percent year-over-year to 41,553 units. However, the auto market's downturn in China has taken a bite out the automaker's success because volume dropped there 32 percent in the third quarter, Reuters reported. A global volume of 1 million vehicles will mean more than doubling 2014's 462,678 deliveries, but JLR has made significant investments to boost production recently. In addition to the future factories, it opened its first plant in China last year and an engine assembly site in the UK. The company also signed a deal with Magna Steyr in 2015 to build an upcoming model in Austria. Related Video: