Jaguar’s New EV Platform Will Be Built In-House CEO Thierry Bolloré previously said the company would look externally for an EV platform suitable enough to underpin a range of upmarket electric Jaguars, but Bolloré has now told investors that JLR is now working on its own platform. Bollore isn’t trying to make Jaguar’s turnaround, called “Reimagine,” easy nor inexpensive. What it appears he’s most interested in doing is making sure the turnaround creates a range of Jaguar electric vehicles that exude the historic Jaguar-ness that the brand still gets credit for, but hasn’t been known for in a while. He told Autocar last year that future products must be “really modern luxury cars that are the copy of nothing in style or design, the top of technology and refinement, but not looking backwards.” Since then, the brand had cast around for an existing electric platform created by another automaker or a supplier that it could adopt for Jaguar use, but nothing met the standard. The decision to go it alone on the platform called Panthera, after the genus of big cats that includes Jaguars, is likely to be related to JLR’s chief designer Gerry McGovern’s requirement that the cars should look unique as the company takes the brand more towards Bentley territory in terms of pricing. Bolloré said that Jaguars need a platform that combines design proportions and capabilities not offered by other car makers. “Concerning the new Jaguar, we’re making unique proportion a priority. That’s the reason why we are doing it by ourselves”.
Jaguar will shift to an all-electric line-up in 2025 with its own EV platform called “Panthera”, after the genus of big cats that includes Jaguars.
Bolloré explained that the plan for Jaguar is to create “distinct cars with no overlap”. They will be “really modern luxury cars that are the copy of nothing in style or design, the top of technology and refinement, but not looking backwards”. The Panthera platform makes sense, if Jaguar can pull it off. Bollore wants the coming Jaguars to be considered alongside Bentley and Aston Martin, so he’ll need those unique proportions along with brilliant design to draw buyers that haven’t considered the brand in ages, if ever. The makeup of the revamped model line remains murky. On the sedan side, it’s thought the XE and XF might become a single midsize fourdoor. The return of a true flagship sedan
isn’t clear, but it seems a good possibility considering the intended competition and as a differentiator with sister brand Land Rover. As to crossovers, the E-Pace and F-Pace might make the transition to battery power, and a new J-Pace flagship crossover looking unlikely in order to, again, maintain space from Land Rover. The I-Pace, which is already electric but built by Magna Steyr on a modified version of JLR’s D7 platform, could be transferred to Panthera or given up. The F-Pace, or some kind of sports car, will carry Jaguar’s heritage into the electricpowered future. Or, if Autocar can be believed, we’ve already overestimated, the British publication saying the range might merely be two electric crossovers and an electric sports car. That outlook, stickered with Bentley-like prices, if successful, would support Bollore’s aim of making a lot more money selling fewer cars. JLR has said it will invest £2.5 billion into the switch to electric vehicles, getting good news of late with the government’s UK Export Finance department agreeing to guarantee £500 million in loans for the purpose.
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Information for this story was from Autoblog and Autocar UK. The I-Pace will survive into Jaguar’s new era but considered separately from its all-new EV family.
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