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27.9.06

How to bring Rover back quickly 

I am a tad late with this, though I did learn the news earlier: the has been bought by , which had first right of refusal when sold it. The , Mich. paid £6 million, which means it will likely hang on to its unit. It also means that , which has its version of the old Rover 75 ready for sale, will need to create a —putting it at a disadvantage to its rivals in Nanjing, the group.
   SAIC may have been better resourced than NAC, but without a brand, it is no better than the many Red Chinese companies wanting to set up shop outside their home market.
   Ford may put out extensions to its Land Rover and models, though most cannot see that happening in the immediate term. The is less than what it could be at this point, so Ford is unlikely to use the brand till well into the 2010s, when it has recovered slightly and people are seeing it through rosier-coloured glasses.
   That is thinking, and Ford is good at that. ‘We haven’t planned new models for this, so we won’t do anything.’
   Sometimes, it is bad having a fixed . need to be semi-fluid for opportunities such as these.
   The Unofficial Austin–Rover Resource’s Keith Adams proposed the X-type be rebadged a Rover, so Jaguar could concentrate on its more premium models. In rare disagreement with Keith, I do not think that is a good idea, considering the could do with a 2·4 or Mark II-segment model, and there would be too many sheetmetal changes needed to make the X-type less Jaguar-like.
   But Keith is on to something, but we need to think just a bit more laterally: could Rover be a brand to slap on to exports of s to Europe? The , for example, is smart, looks less modern than its European rivals, and may appeal to many buyers who want a softer, slightly .
   Its base means it is safe, and it might even mean right-hand-drive engineering won’t be too hard.
   The waterfall can be easily adapted to fit the Rover Viking longship.
   Hardly anyone in Europe knows the Mercury brand.
   Ford, in one move, could get better with its Fusion, Milan and MKZ, increase its representation in the CD segment, tap in to the remaining Rover loyalists, and have a car that won’t seriously cannibalize its other similarly sized models.
   The launch costs need not be great because not enough time has passed for Rover to sink into history like Triumph or Austin has.
   And it can market the car, if it wanted to, in nine months.
   The Mercury Milan doesn’t even need to be a class leader, because as we have seen, Rover have not been after that for a long time.
   The question is: will the new , , have the guts to put a stamp on his with such a coup early, like did at GM?

Del.icio.us tags: Rover Ford Mercury export marketing brand branding brand equity Alan Mulally cars automobiles BMW
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Comments:
nanjing is amazing, i think they will be the top chinese manf out there in 5 years, better than chery and geely

nanjing mg rover  
You are probably right: Nanjing has more vision, I would say. Chery and Geely are rehashing the same old stuff. If they want to beat Nanjing, they will need to come up with some alternative-fuel models.  
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Entries from 2006 to the end of 2009 were done on the Blogger service. As of January 1, 2010, this blog has shifted to a Wordpress installation, with the latest posts here.
   With Blogger ceasing to support FTP publishing on May 1, I have decided to turn these older pages in to an archive, so you will no longer be able to enter comments. However, you can comment on entries posted after January 1, 2010.


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