Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has announced it will cut around 4500 jobs worldwide and introduce widespread cost-cutting measures in a bid to combat slow sales.
The cuts – part of a plan dubbed ‘Charge and Accelerate’ – will begin with a voluntary redundancy scheme in the UK. Around 1500 people were already made redundant by the company in 2018. The cuts aim to “create a leaner, more resilient organisation with a flatter management structure.”
This news comes after JLR announced a pre-tax loss of around £90 million in the third quarter of 2018. Slow business in China is mostly to blame, with sales between July and September 2018 down by more than 13% on the previous year.
That loss, combined with a decline in diesel sales and uncertainty over both Brexit and the new WLTP emissions tests, have created a perfect storm for the British brand.
At the time, JLR announced a £2.5 billion plan to rejuvenate the company, including reducing spending over the next two years by £500 million. The funds raised will be invested into electric vehicle technology – including a new battery assembly centre in Warwickshire, which will be used to make battery packs for future Jaguar and Land Rover electric cars.
Jaguar’s factories in the UK are already feeling the pinch: the firm’s Solihull plant had a two-week shutdown late last year and has already cut jobs, while the factory at Castle Bromwich, which currently builds the XE, XF and XJ saloons, moved to a three-day week.
