HOW I PLAN TO SAVE JAGUAR
JLR CEO Thierry Bolloré tells Steve Cropley about his radical plan to transform Jaguar into a luxury electric brand
In the unique case of Thierry Bolloré, the new and until now somewhat reclusive French-born CEO of Jaguar Land Rover, a picture is most definitely not worth a thousand words. Or even a hundred.
The grim and rather gaunt-looking corporate mugshot of Bolloré that publishers began using when his appointment was announced in September last year – for want of a decent photo session – appeared to show an austere, cropheaded business zealot, a my-way-or-the-highway sort of bloke with the beadiest stare going.
But as editor Mark Tisshaw and I found out in a wide-ranging interview at JLR’S Gaydon HQ a few days ago, this description could hardly be further from the truth.
Of course, Bolloré is a serious and determined man. How could you not be, when one of your first decisions is to kill a new Jaguar project (the XJ) that cost years and billions, and embodied the best work of many good people – replacing it with a Jaguar EV revival plan so radical that it almost defies assessment? And when a few years before that, as the successor to the Renault Group’s allpowerful Carlos Ghosn, you were unceremoniously dumped amid political turmoil that followed your predecessor’s extraordinary arrest?
Yet I don’t believe I’ve met a CEO in recent times with such a frequent and friendly smile, who remains so patiently willing to explain in ever greater detail plans he has already explained many times before, or who signals so readily that, from here on, progress at JLR will depend mostly on the fighting spirit of a workforce he already regards as exceptional.
Bolloré’s appointment came out of the blue. Even the Financial Times, which prides itself on anticipating important corporate moves, failed to list the then Parisian-based ex-renault chief in a German-centric list of possible successors for outgoing Ralf Speth, whose 10-year management span quadrupled the size of JLR, greatly expanded its global footprint and – despite some big bumps in the road – earned billions on the way.
The lingering problem under Speth was Jaguar’s meagre sales and negative earning power: Land Rover was a runaway success but, despite the appeal of its name and heritage, Jaguar never was, even though Speth set about building a Bmwlike model structure to sell a car range that was generally admired. That approach has summarily failed, which is why much of Bolloré’s revival plan, dubbed Reimagine, concentrates on reviving Jaguar via early and wholesale electrification of a smaller range of models, radical in design and much more expensive.
Bolloré himself was very surprised to be contacted by JLR’S headhunter early last year
(“I was about to fly to New York for a very different kind of job”) but, according to the FT, he was by far the most experienced candidate to be considered, having already spent 30 years managing major international automotive suppliers and also – albeit for a short time – been CEO of a global car company at least five times the size of JLR.
Bolloré says he was “super-excited” by the prospect of leading JLR, describing the two marques as “absolutely magic”. Before meeting Natarajan Chandrasekaran, chairman of JLR’S owner, Tata Motors, who would have the final say on the CEO appointment, Bolloré worked on creating his Reimagine plan at a house he keeps in Brittany (where he was born 58 years ago and indulges his lifelong love of sailing), so that when the pair met, there was plenty to discuss.
The pair immediately hit it off: “We talked
about dreams – new dreams for Jaguar, even bigger dreams for Land Rover.” Chandrasekaran was so impressed with the Frenchman’s proposals that, according to insiders, Bolloré now has carte blanche to run JLR as he wants, reporting directly to “Mr Chandra”, even though Speth remains in the picture as vice-chairman. “Truly, it’s no problem,” says Bolloré with one of his ready smiles.
Before starting at Gaydon, Bolloré says he already had considerable knowledge of JLR from having tested all of its products on Renault’s behalf, and through visiting JLR’S stands at motor shows because its design progress and its advanced use of materials was always interesting. “JLR was more or less on the market at the time,” he explains. “Working with my previous employer, I was part of the decision whether to engage or not. That meant I had seen some analysis of the company and knew of its performance in past years.”
When he knew he had the CEO’S job, Bolloré spent the whole month of August in Brittany, finessing Reimagine and meeting his new management team remotely. He started officially in September, spending his first two days driving the latest cars with Mike Cross, JLR’S chief engineer and brand attributes guru. “It was clear Land Rover was a fantastic success but still had a lot of potential,” says Bolloré. “Jaguar? It was damaged. The cars were great. They’d never been so good. But their positioning was not appropriate.”
Which, of course, is the nub of our discussion. Sure, Land Rover’s progress on the three established pillars (Defender, Discovery, Range Rover) looks straightforward enough, even if you have five new EVS to launch by 2025. But how on earth do you position Sir William Lyons’ famous brand for the future?
“Before we consider Jaguar, let’s look at Range Rover,” says Bolloré. “The pricing is very satisfactory and we have impressive volumes. Our positioning for this model is unique. So the thinking with Jaguar is that in future we do the same thing with a range of distinctive, highly desirable electric cars built on a principle of modern luxury – looking forward, not back.
“As Sir William Lyons said, a Jaguar is a copy of nothing. When the E-type was revealed, no one could have anticipated such a design. We will use the same principles. We will offer great design, technology and refinement. With the new models, we will aim to generate a level of desire similar to Range Rover – with completely different shapes, of course. We have already chosen our family of cars in terms of design.”
That’s where he stops. Bolloré won’t reveal much about design details or the size of the range – these are still being refined – although he does allow that the new Jaguar EVS will have a family look. His marketing and design teams are currently working out how the car world will be educated about the direction of New Jaguar. Concept