The Defender's expected 2015 demise will mark the end of the old Land Rover
A couple of weeks ago I first got wind of the news that Land Rover’s plans for back-to-basics Defender replacement had been canned. A few weeks before that, a well-placed source had told me that the person charged with overseeing the Defender replacement had been lobbying to abandon the idea of using a separate chassis.
The senior engineer - reputedly recruited from another premium brand - was quite sure that Land Rover should not plunge back into a global market from which it had been effectively ejected a couple of decades before.
Firstly, building serious numbers of heavy, bluff, vehicles would not be good for the Tata-JLR corporate fuel economy ratings. Secondly, building a rugged off-roader that would compete on quality and price with all-conquering Toyota would not be easy. Thirdly, Tata Motors -which would have had its own version of the new Defender - is in dire straits, with sales tumbling, in a tumbling Indian car market, Indeed, sales of the innovative super-budget Nano city car running about a 20th of what was predicted.
Perhaps the final blow to the scheme - which would have seen the new Defender built in India - was sister company Tata Steel having to take a £1bn hit against its assets in Europe. Tata, JLR’s parent company, probably does not have the cash to splash on the Defender project and JLR’s £2.75bn annual investment in new products is probably best aimed at premium products, where the potential profit margins are so much higher.
So, the anonymous engineer was surely right about Land Rover staying out of the mainstream commercial market and, indeed, it seems that the ‘replacement’ for the current Defender will be a much more premium product, and likely to be based on JLR’s scaleable aluminium platform.
For me, a product like this fits the spirit of the times, at least in the most affluent parts of the world. I find the not-very-mean streets of central west London a fascinating window on automotive fashion. On any sunny Sunday, you’ll see a couple of Aston DB5s mixing it with Ferraris and new-generation Range Rovers and Maseratis. One of the rising stars on these streets is the latest generation Mercedes G-Class, especially the hot AMG versions. It has the aching authenticity of a vehicle originally design for military use but - in the latest version - has the modern drivetrain and plush interior expected by premium buyers.
I can’t help feel this is where the new ‘Defender’ needs to be: ruggedly authentic and unashamedly upmarket. I know that Land Rover enthusiasts will cry foul and lament the brand moving away from it roots. But all that matters is that the company invests in successful markets with the right products, because all that matters is good profit margins and enough free cash to invest in the next generation of vehicles.
Land Rover’s historic back catalogue is a treasure trove of inspiration, especially in terms of styling. But a company of Land Rover’s size can only thrive by driving into premium markets and achieving premium profit margins. Unlike Rover cars over a decade ago, and Jaguar today, Land Rover is doing a brilliant job of reinventing itself. Which means the days of the utilitarian Land Rover are now surely over.