Jaguar Land Rover to open new plant in Slovakia

A new Jaguar Land Rover factory is to be built in Nitra, western Slovakia.

Speculation has been rife about the location of the company’s latest production facility, with Poland being the other eastern Europe site that was reportedly under consideration. However, Jaguar Land Rover has now confirmed it has signed a letter of intent for the potential development of a new plant in Slovakia.

The factory is intended to help Jaguar Land Rover substantially increase its production, with a feasibility study set to explore plans to create capacity for up to 300,000 vehicles. This could help take JLR’s global output to closer to 800,000 vehicles a year. JLR has confirmed that the plant would build the latest, lightweight aluminium Jaguar Land Rover models, with the first cars due off the production line in 2018. The factory is designed to add to existing plants rather than replace them. 

Ralf Speth, JLR's chief executive officer, said: “The expansion of our business globally is essential to support its long-term, resilient growth. As well as creating additional capacity, it allows us to invest in the development of more new vehicles and technologies, which supports jobs in the UK.

“With its established premium automotive industry, Slovakia is an attractive potential development opportunity for us. The new factory will complement our existing facilities in the UK, China and India and the one under construction in Brazil.”

Jaguar Land Rover says it had considered a number of other locations, including the United States, Mexico and elsewhere in Europe – thought to be near the city of Wroclaw in Poland.

However the Slovakian site has got the nod, with the country’s government recently having revealed that it has changed the laws relating to its Act on Investments of Significance in order to win "the investment of the decade".

Economy minister Vazil Hudack was quoted as saying in 2014 that Slovakia had been missing out on big inward investments because it lacked the big industrial parks that companies wanted.

JLR has invested more than £11 billion (Rs 108,273 crore) in product creation and capital expenditure in the past five years, boosting its workforce by 20,000 to 36,000 around the world. This includes more than £500 million (Rs 4,921 crore) on a new engine plant in the Midlands, with 1400 new jobs, and significant investment in plants at Castle Bromwich, Halewood and Solihull. It is also set to start building cars at the Magna Steyr plant in Austria.

The Jaguar XE, Jaguar F-Pace, Range Rover Evoque and Land Rover Discovery Sport are all currently built in the UK. It has not been announced which models will be built in Slovakia, but contenders include the forthcoming Land Rover Discovery 5 and the replacement for the Land Rover Defender.