LONDON: Jaguar Land Rover has announced a 5% increase in pre-tax profits to £2.6bn, confirming the car maker as one of Britain’s biggest export successes.
The west Midlands-based company said it had sold more than 460,000 vehicles during the period, with more than eight out of 10 of those cars sold abroad. China is JLR’s biggest market, followed by mainland Europe, the UK and north America.
A statement said this was the fifth year of growth for the company, a period during which sales and employment at the company had doubled.
During the financial year from April 2014 to the end of March this year, the company unveiled three new Jaguar models. Revenues were £21.9bn, up £2.5bn on the previous year.
The past year has been one of significant achievement, with the expansion of our vehicle ranges and our manufacturing footprint,” said Dr Ralf Speth, chief executive of JLR. “We are committed to delivering further growth this year, maintaining our relentless pace of launching new models and introducing innovative technologies for our discerning customers around the world.”
Last October, the company opened a new manufacturing centre in Wolverhampton, the same month as manufacturing started overseas for the first time at a facility in Changshu in China. Construction of another plant,in Brazil, started in December. The company employs more than 30,000 people in the UK.
It emerged last week that the company is planning a new factory in eastern Europe in order to challenge high-end competitors in Germany. In February, thousands of Jaguar Land Rover vehicles were recalled in the US over problems with brakes and lights.
Expansion at the company has been attributed to the popularity of the Range Rover vehicles. It was reported last week that Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Hungary had been shortlisted as possible sites for a new production facility.
