)
Ratan Tata, former chairman of Tata Sons, has confirmed Jaguar Land Rover plans to have a production plant in North America even as executives of the UK-based brand scout for a suitable location.
Speaking to Automotive News Tata said, Tata Motors is "indeed looking at North America as a location for another plant", though the exact location is yet to be ascertained. Tata was special guest at the South Carolina Automotive Summit.
Earlier this month JLR executives met the governor of Georgia, US to discuss setting up a new factory in the state, a local newspaper had reported. The company, which is fast exhausting production capacity at its UK plants thanks to robust demand for almost all its products, is forced to de-bottleneck production lines to extract additional output.
Over the last several months Jaguar and Land Rover had to overlook the US market and reroute its supplies to China where products fetch more than twice the price charged in the US. China thus became the margin growth driver for the two luxury brands.
Lower supplies to the US is despite the fact that the country remains one of the top three markets for JLR where demand still remains significant. US generates 17% of total sales of JLR. Sources say the US plant is targeted for a capacity of 100,000 units a year.
JLR's present capacity in the UK is between 450,000-500,000. The China JV which began production in October is slated to add 130,000 units a year while a small facility in Brazil will have a capacity of 24,000 units a year. JLR also has small assembly operations in India and plans to set up a new facility in Saudi Arabia.
JLR is already running late in having a manufacturing footprint in the US. German luxury car makers BMW opened its plant in the Us in 1994, whereas rival Mercedes-Benz began building SUVs in 1997.
