I’ll give you 3 shillings for Jaguar.

Coming soon: The Jaguar Patel.

Madcapp, can I get a 30% share for a dead squirrel and 2 bottlecaps?

I’ll raise you a rusty bike, 3 plastic hubcaps and CA36GTP’s sister.

Hey, now that’s just not right!

No one wants a rusty bike.

only 1.5 billion? Damn some other auto suppliers are worth far more…

I dunno, what’s the going dowry for an ugly 5th daughter with an eyepatch and a bum knee?

Ford will sell to the highest bidder, just watch…

No, really? As opposed to the lowest bidder? You’re a rocket scientist, ain’t ya?

…ultimate delivery vehicle for ‘Curry in a Hurry’.

please be equity

This is too bad. I hate seeing brands with a lot of name recognition and history get sold off to some obscure manufacturer who can’t even hold their jockstrap. I’ll be impressed when those companies can make one of these:

http://www.vicarage-jaguar.com/e-type_4.jpg

I would love to see a new version of the XJ220 come out, I think thats got to be one of the coolest cars I’ve ever seen.

Last dying breaths of the once great iconic English brands.
Prey for prodrive-Aston and Tesla.

Jaguar is out of ideas, I think. The new XF, while nice looking, could be anything. I’m surprised none of the big car company’s has stepped up for Land Rover, though, even if just for the right to make the Defender and Range Rover(like Chrysler buying AMC, mainly for Jeep).

You’re buying brand heritage / equity, not good vehicles, or even vehicles that make sense. (The new Jag is nice but it walks away from its bloodlines. What’s the idea behind building a car that looks like a Lexus, only more expensive and 1000% worse reliability?)

So $1.5 billion is a more than fair price for two unique brands that are currently backed by a bunch of crap cars nobody wants. Land Rovers are among the world’s worst-assembled, most-failure-prone vehicles. And that’s before you consider the marketability of 12mpg products in a $4.50-a-gallon world.

AP3x: ditto on the xj220

Coming soon: The Jaguar Patel.
Comment by CA36GTP, posted on December6 at 9:20 am,
LMAO, Jaguar will now be known as Jaguatata
Madcapp, i bid a run over dog, expired meat and a bottle of moonshine

LP640,
Get with the program. We don’t call it moonshine anymore, now it’s “Ecologically friendly consumable ethanol”

If this were baseball, I would trade them for a bucket of balls and a player to be named later

a run over dog? that`s funny as hell….good one lp640.

They will be makin a jag model with the tata indica just like ford did with the mondeo.

lol @ johnnycanuck, “curry in a hurry”
well i guess that Jaguar is now going to become Indian. I was hoping that somone like Bmw or the VW group would buy them and sort them out.

The Rotman Investment Management Group has cumulated all its assets and we are proud to announce our bid of 72 US dollars and 48 cents for Jaguar and Land Rover. We are fairly confident Ford will choose the RIM Group as the final buyer, due to our long experience in reading and commenting on internet car news blogs and forums.

This is a damn shame. I think Jaguar was finally ready to begin a turnaround. I don’t think the change of ownership to an Indian company will be beneficial. Even if the previous owner was Ford.

rotman if you are looking for a business partner i can come up with the additional 27.52usd to make an even hundred.

Well, as Tigger would have said to his friends Jaguar and Land Rover in the Hundred Acre Wood: “TaTa for now!”

so you’re proposing a RIMjob

Isn’t there a song about this… “take the money and run” ?

…didn’t Aerosmith do something called ‘a taste of India’? I think this is going to leave a bad taste in a lot of people’s mouths.

I have said and maintain that Tata will win.
Indians just want to own a piece of Britain.

Shall we rename the companies now? Taguar and Tand Tover

As much as I love TATA and M&M’s enthusiasm, having owned “flagships” from both of them, I SURE HOPE whomever gets FORD’s business is planning on learning from Landrover and Jag and using the pairs expertise (which despite their shortcomings is far better than TATA and M&M both) to bring their own products up to some sort of decent standards. If they are planning on just getting the pair to use the brand power and market their own products as they are! that WILL NOT go well… IMHO

I respect TATA and M&M for their great work in bringing decent vehicles and competition in Indian automotive market, but they’ve both got a lot to learn before they can attempt to mess with even the likes of Hyundai.

I think its a little concerning that a wonderful English Brand is going to India. Sure Ford has been hopeless but for those of us who love the historic Jags and what they represent, (great design, style, a touch of decadence) this sale will represent a new low for the Jag brand.
Jaguar needs to go back and have a look at its heritage, what made the cars great and worthy of ownership and i dont mean just copying an old model and trying to mass produce (eg S-Type). Im talking about determining and understanding the values Jag holds to be true and designing cars which reflect these values. The XF concept looked great but the mods (esp the front) are a big let down. I just dont see how companies such as Tata who mass produce generic looking cars as cheaply as possible can possibly contribute to a Jag turn around

I hope Tata wins for the sake of “what goes around, comes around” irony. And later they can combine a convenience store with a car dealership.

HoosierHero, I think Jag’s prob has been that even THEY coudln’t recreate smething to recapture the hearts of their publlic like the E-Type did…

Tata has a JV with Fiat, which won’t help them much I reckon…

Sod it I have no clue as to what will happen. Tata can be smart about it or **** it all up… We just have to wait and see.

The former colonial masters have been humiliated.

ANY citizen from India will be glad to rub English nose into this story every single day of their life ….. until the next re-incarnation.

TaTaguar……
damn…my XJ aint worth **** anymore….I’m going to have to drive that sucka into the ground!

That will be the last Rover I own if Tata wins this.

just a matter of time before they start using these companies as gateways to flood the market.

I think it is a brilliant idea. They already have dealers network in US: 7/11.

Mr Patel your new Taguar XJ “India Special v6″ is here sir

Ford are stupid for selling Jagur and LR to Tata, not that they were worth much anyway. I gues we’ll be seeing more RR’s in India than anwhere else on the planet

India needs Range Rover. Moon has better surface then best Indian roads.

My “priend” Rashimir “bill” be “nes” “beek” at Mumbay, He “bill” buy several seven eleven to sell all that Jaguar cars, it “bill” produce in India.

Attn Rajalmani Patel

Land Rover is actually very profitable with perhaps the best range of SUV’s of ANY manufacturer, not to mention it IS a prestigious brand. Lets not forget, TATA is dripping with money…its kinda sad to think that most people here have a low opinion of them becuase they are an Indian company. You do know India is a leader in high tech fields such as medicine, computers and IT? The funny thing is, the brands might now actually receive the investment that Ford hasn’t been able to give. India is well on its way to being a superpower….people shouldn’t forget that.

Tata ????? Why Tata ?????? NNNNnnnnnoooooooooooo!!!!! Does this mean that Ford have now robbed Jaguar of all the quality British staff that it can, so it can send it to a destiny in the Dustbin under the Tata name????????

And as for Land Rover, why, why, why, when they are so profitable for Ford at the moment?????………….Oh yea I forgot Ford are just about to launch a ripped off Range Rover and call it a Lincoln, or was that Mercury, or ??????

gekko71: Heritage doesn’t mean **** if they now produce ****.

These 2 brands were on the verge of death at ford and now they are effectively dead. What the hell does Tata now about making prestige cars?????

Actually NustoTFL, TATA is keen to keep the three Jag/Land Rover factories in the UK employing appx 16,000 people… So… go figure.

You guys need to read more. Lamborghini was once owned by the son of an Indonesian ex-dictator. That’s the biggest muslim country in the world. I don’t see that mentioned anywhere now and it hasn’t tainted Lambo’s image in any way. How bout Ferrari’s famous “reception” of the catholic church? Ultimately it’s whether your products are desirable or not. If you keep making **** decades after decades, your history doesn’t mean ****.

BRIEF: For the fiscal year ended 31 March 2007, Tata Motors Limited’s revenues rose 38% to RS331.52B. Net income rose 21% to RS18.11B.

Which is better than Ford is doing….

Oh and, The Stig et al… Convenience stores?

Tata is huge and as well as being the fifth largest steel producer in the world (owning 100% of the immense Corus group too), Tata Tea is the largest tea brand in India, and the company they now own, Tetley, is the largest tea company in the United Kingdom and Canada and the second largest in the United States by volume…

They also have the largest IT Consultancy company in Asia and another IT company Elxsi which even has an R&D arm for Automotive technologies.

They also have a satellite company which has a deal with BSkyB to use their Sky name (Tata Sky). They offer Interactive Services which is a lot better than NTL could ever provide after years of promises…

Hell, they even have their own Research Institution, with a deemed university status…

The group itself has a wider scope of business including a power company, a chemical company, a watch company etc… they provide financial services, they have hotel affiliations and more.

Their own company Tata Motors had a revenue in 2006 of $9bn USD which is more than 4 times their bid on the companies…

So… I’m sure they can handle a pocket-money industry (Well their Corus group acquisition in the Steel sector was with a winning bid of 608p per share valuing the deal at $11.3bn USD really does make this acquisition seem peanuts) with brands such as Jaguar and Land Rover…

So long losers! Jag and Land Rover were stupid purchases under Jacko Nasser. Its good to see Ford rid itself of these distractions from their core brand…Ford! Maybe Volvo is next…we can only hope.

jdasch1: you kind of have a very valid point about Ford focussing on their core brand.

I was reading an article in a UK Motoring magazine which suggested that Ford Europe’s own cars were so brilliant now, competing on levels beyond their original competitors… Blowing VW out of the water in most instances and even providing efforts to rival BMW (bar the fact they lack RWD models in Europe). They were also reviewing the Jaguar XF which has received great reviews with the UK motoring press (Top Gear, AutoExpress, Car, What Car etc) saying that ideally Ford have done well enough with their new Mondeo that they don’t NEED a “luxury” car like Jag anymore.

Lets face it, the press like the new Mondeo and the new Focus out in Europe so much that they don’t see a need for any other brand but their own…. If only Ford NA saw that.

Ford Australia do… They have a great well-developed chassis and platform for their Falcon, but have taken inspiration still from Ford Europe, especially the new Mondeo which is seeing the return of the Mondeo to Australia, where it initially was a flop in its older incarnations.

What is it about Ford NA that leaves them in such a pig-headed stance over the matter. Surely they could see the benefits of globalising the models?

Well, yes… the lastest news is the next incarnation of the Focus should be the same in Eurple and NA, so hold out until then America because before you know it Ford might be doing something right by you finally.

Best of luck to Jag and Land Rover, and indeed Tata… This could be a very worthwhile project or it could go horribly wrong, but I believe the project would do well, afterall, Corus Group is operating in Europe still, just more profitably now that Tata Steel has had its input. There’s a lot to be said for Tata that would inspire and bring awe to the few who may be intelligent enough to properly look at the history and success of Tata as it is.

-JB