Is Ford about to do a British Leyland?

In the interests of saving the shareholders money, many years ago British Leyland grouped many of their brands together under the same roof. Then they found they could save even more money by retrenching the “extra” designers they had left over. After all, why did Riley need a designer, when there were Morris and Austin ones? For that matter, what about MG? This brought on the infamous “badge engineering” that saw Mini variants with different grilles being sold as Morrises or Austins or Rileys (though from memory, the Riley got some vestigial tail fins, so help me)! The end result was the downfall of Riley and eventually the whole conglomerate fell over.

The latest on the British automotive front is the proposed merger of three marques owned by Ford Motor Company, and right now, FoMoCo are hurting, revamping and regrouping. As part of that, Jaguar, Land Rover and Aston Martin are to be brought into a single business unit within Ford’s Premier Automotive Group in a move causing concern in some quarters over the potential for losing their brand identity.

Aston Martin

According to Automotive News, an “operating committee” of Premier Automotive Group executives established on October 31 will be reconstituted as a formal board of directors this week. Executive reassignments under the new British-brand corporate structure will be made in December.

Again, the same “logic” as British Leyland is being touted. Putting the three brands under one corporate structure could create savings by eliminating personnel and administrative overlaps. The three marques already have combined their operations in North America and Japan, with many executives having control over disciplines for all three brands.

Now this may sound logical, but is it? North America and Japan do not make Jaguars, Land Rovers or Aston Martins - they only sell and service them. That’s a very different situation from designing and building them.

The source at Automotive News did note that a group insider who insisted on anonymity said he was worried that the three British brands have little in common, negating any argument for combining them. Aston Martin is a boutique maker of performance sports cars; Land Rover is a premium sport-utility maker; and Jaguar, a luxury-heritage brand. The concept that badge engineering could happen with these three is not a pleasant thought. Will Jaguar engined Land Rovers be the thin end of the wedge?

New Land Rover F1

Actually no, the thin end is the location. The three will combine their engineering operations at Land Rover’s headquarters in Gaydon, England. The automakers’ design teams will work from the same styling studio in London. This is certainly back to the future.

Was this the last straw for former managing director Jonathan Browning who suddenly resigned from the group in October? Industry sources believe the resignation was triggered by his opposition to the new structure and his concern that it would undermine the carefully nurtured Jaguar brand.

Browning’s replacement, Mike Beasley, has far less authority than did Browning, raising concerns that he will not be able to protect Jaguar from board decisions. Adding to that fear is the elevation of Land Rover’s chairman to become a Ford vice president, incorporating the presidency of Jaguar and, it is rumoured, presidency of Aston Martin as well.

Karl Ludvigsen, an industry analyst based in London who specializes in Ford says, “What we are seeing are key steps leading to a structure other than the one they have with Premier Automotive Group. The building blocks are being put in place. I am not able to think of any reason why it wouldn’t make terrific sense making PAG a single business unit with three brands.” I’m sorry, Karl, the British Leyland disaster is enough of a reason for me!

Thai Traviq jamming Japan The Chevrolet Zafira based Subaru Traviq is making good progress in Japan with 761 units going out the showroom doors in the first month of retail sales over there. Subaru Traviq These are (as reported earlier in Automania) built right here on the Eastern Seaboard and feature local Thai component manufacturers supplying around 40% of the content for these vehicles. GM Thailand are fairly chuffed with their product, and with the exported “Holden” Zafira being very well thought of in Australia, the acceptance by Japan of the Subaru badged variant is another feather in the cap of the Eastern Seaboard Industrial Estate (Rayong) factory’s cap. According to William S. Bostwick, the executive director of ASEAN operations for General Motors and president of GM Thailand, “The General Motors operation at Rayong was designed as a state-of-the-art production facility to produce top quality motor vehicles, primarily for the export market. Most other motor manufacturers in Thailand built their production capabilities to target the domestic market and turned to greater focus on exports following the economic crisis. Our strategic decision to build an export platform has proved highly successful and the news of the record sales in Japan underline this success.” Ignoring the fact that in the initial phase of the building of the ISIE plant there was some vacillation by the decision makers at GM, there is no doubt that the plant is now well on track and with the export programs already announced for the Isuzu pickup and the Alfa Romeo 156, the future looks very good.

Autotrivia Quiz

Last week I asked you to take a look at the picture shown again now. This car was launched in at the 1984 Turin Motor Show. It featured a magnesium cased Hewland transaxle and something else about its transmission to make it a very notable road car for the Ford Motor Company. What is the car and what was so notable from FoMoCo’s point of view about the transmission?

This was the very special Ford RS 200, the rally car which was beaten by the demise of the Group B regulations, not by anything else. In rally form the turbocharged BDA derived engine could churn out 450 bhp, but the “cooking” model for road use still had 250 neddies under the foot in a 1000 kg motor car. It is important in Ford history as it was their first 4WD road car.

So this week, and perhaps a little known fact for some race fans. The concept of qualifying to get the grid position was not always the case. The drivers used to draw for positions and that was it. However, (and here’s a huge clue) in 1933 the first Grand Prix to be started from grid positions determined by the times in practice was held. What was that first Grand Prix?

For the Automania FREE beer this week, be the first correct answer to fax 427 596 or email [email protected]

Is there an F1 Vee Dubb around the corner? With the major German manufacturers BMW and Mercedes both in F1, there is a fairly well based rumour around that VW are considering taking the step too, with a strong possibility being the purchase of BAR, a team that has not covered itself in glory and may even be an embarrassment to major investor, British American Tobacco. VW F1? Fuelling the rumours is the recent formation of a new sporting division by Volkswagen AG which will be headed by Chairman Bernd Pischetsrieder. This section will be made up of some of the sporting marques that VW have snaffled over the past few years including Lamborghini, Audi, Seat and Bentley. Seat will almost certainly remain in rallying, while it’s understood that the Le Mans Bentley’s will end up being re-badged and running as Lamborghinis, while Audi who have won anything worth winning in sports cars would be the most likely name badge to end up sitting on the nose cone of a BAR.