JLR’s electric future
Lowdown on Brit brand’s forthcoming EV line-up
“The new Crossover is some of design director Gerry McGovern’s finest work yet”
JAGUAR Land Rover has confirmed a multi-million pound investment in its Castle Bromwich plant to build electric cars (see panel, Page 12), and Auto Express can exclusively reveal the three models that will start rolling down production lines from early 2021.
The biggest news is the first Land Rover product to be built at Castle Brom – and a ground-breaking one at that. The new Range Rover Crossover (it definitely won’t be called Road Rover, despite speculation) will follow an all-electric Jaguar XJ and Jaguar J-Pace SUV.
The Crossover, previewed in our exclusive image, will use JLR’s new Modular Longitudinal Architecture (MLA), revealed at the company’s investor conference last year, which means it will come with full-electric power as well as plug-in and mild-hybrid guises.
Land Rover insiders have hinted that the new Crossover is some of design director Gerry McGovern’s finest work yet, taking cues from the developing Range Rover design language but in a new, lower, sleeker form. It’ll be the most road-biased Range Rover product ever, with a focus on luxury and ride quality, giving it clear space between itself and more dynamic Jaguar products.
Price-wise, the Crossover will sit below an all-new Range Rover (due in 2021 and also based on MLA), although that car is expected to move upmarket to more closely rival the likes of Bentley’s Bentayga.
First out of the newly modernised Castle Bromwich factory gates will be an all-new, all-electric Jaguar XJ, described by company insiders as an XJ for the future to do battle with Tesla. The firm already has plenty of expertise in pure-electric cars with the award-winning I-Pace, but that car sits on a bespoke platform and makes use of a 90kWh battery. We’d expect the XJ to use a slightly bigger battery to offer a range of more than 300 miles and impressive performance.
Like the car it replaces, the new XJ will carve itself a niche away from the Mercedes S-Class to offer a more dynamic and hi-tech form of luxury car. However, the
batteries under the floor mean that the new model will sit slightly higher than the outgoing XJ, although it retains that car’s slippery shape – as shown in our exclusive image on Page 11 – but with a more cabrearwards design. Expect a few design features to mark it out as an electric car, too.
Although the new XJ will use the MLA platform, it will only be offered as a pure EV, and it is expected to feature the very latest Autonomous, Connected, Electric and Shared (ACES) technology. Level-three autonomous driving-assistance features are expected to be on board, while the car should be able to be updated using JLR’s forthcoming Software Over The Air (SOTA) technology. This means that additional features can be added via a WiFi link rather than by having to visit a dealer, while micro payments for insurance and parking could also be made through the system.
We may see the new XJ at some stage towards the end of next year, although it’s unlikely to go on sale until 2021.
Following that in 2022, the Jaguar J-Pace, also previewed by our exclusive image, will complete the brand’s SUV line-up. This new, full-size SUV will rival BMW’s X5 and, like the Range Rover Crossover, will be offered with the full range of powertrains that MLA allows: petrol and diesel engines boosted by a 48-volt mild-hybrid system, petrol with plug-in hybrid and full-electric. As well as rivalling BMW, JLR recently announced that it would be working with the German company on its next generation of electric drive units, to be assembled in JLR’s Wolverhampton factory. These will be powered by batteries that come from the new Battery Assembly Centre at Hams Hall. All of these components will find their way into the cars manufactured at Castle Bromwich.
The new MLA technology will play a big part in JLR’s promise that every model it produces will offer an electrified option by next year. The platform is expected to be rolled out across the entire JLR product range in due course, covering everything from the next generation of Jaguar XE all the way up to the new Range Rover. As well as the technology and efficiency benefits, there are also substantial cost savings from using the same platform, powertrain and ACES technology across the two brands’ portfolios.
Speaking at the Castle Bromwich plant, Jaguar Land Rover CEO Dr Ralf Speth called for more investment in UK battery production to help make electric cars more affordable: “Affordability driven by lower battery cost and convenient charging that’s as easy as it is to refuel a conventional vehicle today will drive the uptake of electric vehicles to the levels that we need,” he said.
Speth added: “However, affordability will only be achieved if we make the batteries here in the UK, close to vehicle production, to avoid the cost and safety risk of buying them from abroad.
“The UK has the raw materials, scientific research in our universities and an existing supplier base to make the UK a key player in this global electrification revolution”.
“The MLA tech will play a big part in JLR’s promise that every new model will offer an electrified option”