Jaguar aims higher than ever with its reinvention. Exactly where no one is succeeding (at the moment)

The curtain has risen and Jaguar, just a few days after a first preview, has confirmed what it has in store for us in the future. Color, new design and a brand image that has little to do with the past.

Whether you like it more or less, of course, Jaguar has decided break with the past. Let us remember that it has put its production on pause to launch cars on the market that have nothing to do with what we have seen so far. A historic repositioning to save a company in very low hours.

A point in its history.

A point that only time will tell if it is full stop either full stop.

Brand repositioning

The automobile market is uncertain. Its history is full of corpses, of excellent or extremely rational cars that were resounding failures or those that no one has managed to turn into best sellers. Luckily, because everything would be much more predictable than it already is, there is no magic formula that guarantees success.

Aware that they have few bullets left in the chamber, Jaguar has decided to be brave. In recent years they have not managed to position their cars in a better place than the trio of premium germans. Bad strategic decisions (its partnership with Ford and its cost savings) and its reliability problems (always among the most notable brands) They have led the company to lose the aspirational halo in which they always wanted to have fought.

With just over 60,000 units sold worldwide (a third of what they sold in 2019) and losing money year after year, Jaguar has little to lose with a reinvention that seeks to reposition the brand and change it completely. The new direction was announced with a hyper-colorful video in which not a single car was seen. The example that it was one more brand that “had panicked” in the words of experts consulted by Bloomberg.

It’s been just over 24 hours since we finally learned what Jaguar wanted to teach us. A prototype of a monolithic figure that draws slightly from its past: very long nose, very set back cabin and a curved drop at the rear.

What does this tell us? The absence of a rear window tells us that they will seek to differentiate themselves from the competition, the extremely clean and flat shapes that are based on what Land Rover has achieved and the futuristic interior that we can expect, practically, anything.

But, above all, it tells us that Jaguar will enter the fight in the hyper-luxury electric car market. To begin with, they want their future electric models let’s not see them for less than 100,000 pounds. That is to say, their next launches will start at 120,000 euros and will probably go much further with an enormous layer of customization, something that luxury brands have been working on for a long time.

That is, the intention is to look in the rearview mirror at Mercedes or Porsche, which have electric cars that can move in those figures but have less groundbreaking proposals. Mercedes and Porsche have cars in their EQS and Taycan that start at 105,000 euros.

Everything indicates (and the image of its prototype thus seems to anticipate it) that Jaguar wants to get closer to the model of Rolls-Royce than the higher-cost German electric ones. BMW can be a good example.

It’s like jumping into the void with a parachute that we don’t know if it’s defective.

A market with an uncertain future

If you ask me, I would say that it makes all the sense in the world for the ultra-luxury sedan market to jump to the electric format. Another thing is supercars. But where tranquility, absence of noise and softness are valued, the electrical market has it all to offer.

The electric ultra-luxury sedan has another advantage: it is huge. With sizes exceeding five meters long, there is enough chassis to install huge batteries that guarantee hundreds of kilometers without making a single stop. Furthermore, it is not important here that its size (and, therefore, price) determines the final cost of the car.

But, as we said, the automobile market is capricious. Mercedes opted to break with classicism in its EQS and position it as a vehicle that boasted cutting-edge technology and anticipated the future of the brand, such as its Hyperscreen. It is failing in sales.

Lucid, one of the luxury electric car brands that has attracted the most attention, has assured that wants to reduce the price of its models to make the company more sustainable by increasing sales volume. That is, it has started with an aspirational model to lower expectations (and gain customers) as Tesla also did.

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BMW, however, does seem to be getting better results with its luxury sedan. The BMW i7 is a little more expensive (from 115,000 euros) but it is easy to go tens of thousands of euros above this figure as soon as we configure the vehicle. All in all, BMW has had months where electric versions have represented 43% of model sales.

Rolls-Royce also seems pleased with the ride of its Spectre. The electric model occupied 38% of its deliveries in the first quarter of 2024 and its production is already committed until 2026. In this case, it is a much lower sales volume but the figures are promising for the company.

In favor of Jaguar it must be said that land rover It has also opted to raise the bar for some models, such as the Defender, and is reaping great results. Their cars have the same reliability problem as Jaguar but the truth is that they like and clients seem to buy their styling. In Bloomberg They explain how the company has managed to increase its sales while increasing the price of its vehicles.

The market for the most luxurious electric vehicles seems yet to be exploited. In Financial Times They collect different voices from the industry that are betting on growth in the coming years and point out that 44% of the owners of these vehicles are already decided to make the leap to electric vehicles. In addition, they remember that it is a market where the customer can afford to have cars of all types in the garage. An electric luxury sedan can complement a supercar with a V12 engine.

We will also have to see what they offer inside. The fall of German manufacturers in China has shown that the world’s largest electric car market demands more daring and risky proposals. “It was just an electrified Porsche. That’s all”. This is how a Chinese buyer defined her feeling of disappointment when buying her first Porsche Taycan and why she had switched to local manufacturers in this article Bloomberg.

In short, Jaguar had two options: to be immobile and introduce himself for the umpteenth time as the new (insert brand here premium fashionable) or break with everything and look for your own language. He preferred the second.

You may crash but you also gain the chance to succeed.

Photos | Jaguar

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