Quality issues cost Jaguar Land Rover 100,000 annual sales

Jaguar Land Rover CEO Thierry Bollore has conceded the company is haemorrhaging more than 100,000 vehicles sales around the world each year due to quality issues.

“The dissatisfaction of our customers was really detrimental to our natural volume," Bollore told Automotive News.

"The missed opportunities today are massive. It's more than 100,000 healthy sales that we could perform."

Both Jaguar and Land Rover were among the five worst-performing brands in the most recent JD Power satisfaction rankings in the United States and didn’t even figure in the top 26 of the 2020 Consumer Reports vehicle reliability survey.

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However, Bollore claimed his efforts to improve quality across the Jaguar and Land Rover vehicle ranges were starting to bear fruit.

"We are reducing the complexity of our vehicles massively, he said.

“The result will be fewer things going wrong because the process will not be as complex.”

A sign that his efforts appear to be working can be seen with a reduction in the cost of warranty repairs, which between March and December in 2020 averaged about US$680 (A$870); about half the average cost during the period in 2019.

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Bollore said it was important to improve perceptions about the quality of JLR vehicles during the next few years as it strives to focus on upmarket EVs from 2025.

That means appealing to future-focused, tech-interested buyers that might otherwise look to pioneering electric-only brands like Tesla and Rivian.

He recently announced the first all-electric Land Rover model will debut in 2024 as part of a combined ICE/EV line-up, while Jaguar will prioritise a dedicated electric platform.

As part of that move, the next-generation XJ large luxury sedan has been scrapped, though Bollore hasn't ruled out a return for the legendary badge in EV form.