The engine collaboration came hot on the heels of the surprise announcement in June about plans for JLR and BMW to co-operate on the development of powertrains for future pure-electric and electrified vehicles.  When that deal was announced, Nick Rogers, JLR’s engineering chief, said: “It was clear from discussions with BMW Group that both companies’ requirements for next-generation EDUs to support this transition have significant overlap, making for a mutually beneficial collaboration.”  The enforced move towards electrification is proving extremely expensive for even the most profitable of car makers. Even Mercedes-Benz is seeing premium profit margins vanish because of the cost of new platforms and electrification.  Autocar’s source claimed that the latest move beyond EDUs and into sharing engines is intended to allow JLR to reduce its investment in its own Ingenium engine range. That would then allow the company to re-allocate resources to the huge costs involved in what JLR calls ‘ACES’ (autonomous, connected, electric, shared) technology for future vehicles.  In truth, most models bigger than a city car will probably have to be plug-in hybrids to meet the 2025 and 2030 EU emissions regulations – and that’s why the prospect of JLR sharing the new BMW FAAR platform is now on the agenda.  The FAAR platform  BMW’s FAAR architecture, seen most recently on the new BMW 1 Series, has been designed to accommodate petrol, hybrid and full-electric powertrains.  The FAAR transverse-engined architecture will in time underpin all front-wheel-drive BMW models and Mini’s entire range. Using it would dig JLR out of a significant future hole caused by the lack of a modern, compact, hybrid platform for 2025 and beyond.  Adding JLR’s current small and medium volumes of 250,000 to BMW’s 850,000 or so production of front-drive vehicles will be seen as a handy boost. It would also integrate FAAR family production at BMW’s Oxford plant and JLR’s Halewood facility, which would be backed up by engine and battery production at Hams Hall and electric motor production in Wolverhampton.  With the addition of two small Jaguars and a baby Land Rover, FAAR platform volumes could approach 1.5 million annually by 2025.  The FAAR architecture looks like a good fit for JLR because it is expected to span cars sized between 4.2m and 4.6m in length. Smaller FAAR-based cars are unlikely because the need to package batteries in the new models means there’s a minimum length for the architecture.  For example, today’s Discovery Sport (4.6m) is almost the same length as the current BMW 2 Series Grand Tourer. A Mini Countryman is 4.3m long and a Range Rover Evoque 4.37m.  The recently launched second-generation Evoque and updated Discovery Sport are both built on JLR’s Premium Transverse Architecture, which, even though it has been developed to accommodate electrified powertrains, is still an updated version of an older platform. Using BMW’s more modern FAAR platform would potentially offer great economies of scale, reducing production costs.  The new models Although details are very thin on the ground, the new baby Land Rover is likely to be an urban-focused – although still highly capable – compact off-roader inspired by the looks of the new Defender. This potentially Freelander-badged car would be able to trace its roots back to the DC100 concept of 2011, which found favour for its fun, compact design but not as a replacement for the Defender, as it was originally intended.  The two Jaguars are also likely to be crossovers, one more coupé-like than the other and both sold as part of the Pace SUV family. Inspiration for the lower-roofed new Jaguar might come from the 2003 R-D6 hatchback concept, the first Jaguar design of ex-design boss Ian Callum. The names A-Pace, B-Pace, C-Pace and D-Pace are all available to Jaguar.  All three potential models are expected to be priced from around £24,000 and all will be hybrid. Most of the variants will use plug-in technology as part of the move to reduce JLR’s fleet CO2.  The key date for the three new vehicles – as well as the third-generation Evoque and Discovery Sport – will be 2025, when the next round of strict and rigorously enforced EU fleet CO2 regulations come into force.  Stricter emissions rules At the moment, JLR has a derogation from meeting next year’s 95g/km CO2 EU fleet target, but by 2025, it is likely to be required not only to reduce the average CO2 output of its vehicles to just 80g/km but also ensure that around 15% of its annual output are pure-electric or long-distance plug-in vehicles.  If that sounds difficult, from 1 June 2021, the European Commission also intends to use real-world information to monitor actual fuel and energy use. Makers will be expected to supply a model’s VIN details, data on fuel or electrical energy used and the total distance travelled. The EU plans to use the VIN and real-world CO2 emissions to produce a running report
Origin: Two new compact Jaguar SUVs on the cards, tipped to use BMW platform