Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has taken the first steps to convert its Halewood plant near Liverpool to build electric vehicles, securing the factory’s future as the company begins rolling out low- and zero-emission vehicles.
The company has begun the tendering process to upgrade the factory to build cars on the new ‘Native BEV’ Electrified Modular Architecture (EMA), a source close to the process told Autocar.
Models using the new platform will include replacements for the Range Rover Evoque and Land Rover Discovery Sport, both of which are made at the Halewood plant.
JLR has previously confirmed the platform for the Halewood plant, one of three vehicle assembly facilities in the UK, however this confirmation will come as good news for the facility’s 3700 employees in a period of high uncertainty.
The extended shutdown period to convert the plan will happen in 2024, the source told Autocar. JLR has said cars on its EMA platform will arrive in the same year.
The company has previously said it will repurpose its Castle Bromwich facility, east of Birmingham, after the company decided to cut manufacturing capacity by 25% as part of its Reimagine transformation plans announced in 2021 by CEO Thierry Bolloré.
Halewood’s confirmed role in building electric cars – as well as plug-in hybrids and hybrids from the flexible EMA platform – will ensure its future is secure well into the medium term. The factory was opened in 1963 by Ford, which retains part of the site for building gearboxes and will invest more than £200 million repurposing it as an electric drivetrain factory by 2024.
This summer, JLR also submitted planning requests to extend Halewood’s body shop “to increase its production capacity for new model lines”, according to documents lodged with the local Knowsley council. The new two-storey building would expand the additional body shop, where the car’s metal bodies are joined together, by around 32,000 square metres.
JLR is currently putting the new EMA platform through its engineering approval process, chief financial officer Adrian Mardell told investors during a July conference call.
The EMA platform has been described as “born from an obsession with simplicity” according to JLR. The platform is “battery agnostic”, meaning it can accept any battery shape and chemistry, JLR has claimed. It can accept “small-capacity, high-performance combustion engines”, which is likely to mean the plug-in hybrid, hybrid and mild hybrid versions of the car will use the company’s 1.5-liter three-cylinder engine that powers the Range Rover Evoque and Land Rover Discovery Sport plug-in hybrid models.
