Decade-and-a-half since Rover collapse | Car Talk - Car News Apr 2020

CAR TALK
main article image

13:13 Thursday 16 Apr 2020

Last week marked 15 years since British-owned mass car production ended with the demise of the MG Rover Group.

The Longbridge-based MG Rover Group ceased trading on 8 April 2005 after the collapse of a rescue package by the Chinese state-owned SAIC left the company with a debt of more than £1.4billion.  The collapse of the MG Rover Group, owned by the Phoenix Vehicle Holdings consortium headed by John Towers, left 6,000 staff unemployed after production ended at the Birmingham car factory.  The consortium formed the MG Rover Group in 2000 having bought the former Rover Group’s mass market car business from BMW for a nominal £10, producing  a range of mainstream models under the century-old Rover brand with sportier models badged as MG.

Rover was one of the most iconic names in British automotive manufacturing, having been around since 1904.  It became part of British Leyland in the late 1960s, a behemoth intended to consolidate and strengthen the country’s vehicle building sector but which soon ran into trouble and was part-nationalised in 1975.  As the Rover Group it was owned by British Aerospace between 1988 and 1996, before coming under German ownership as part of the BMW.

The MG Rover Group used the Rover brand name under licence from Ford, who had purchased it from BMW along with Jaguar and Land Rover.  The brand name is now owned by current Jaguar Land Rover owners Tata, but is not currently used by the Indian-owned conglomerate and is considered dormant.  Production of MG branded cars restarted at Longbridge in August 2007 under the ownership of the Chinese Nanjing Automobile, which after a merger is now ironically part of SAIC.  Production at factory ceased again in 2016, with the current range of vehicles marketed in the UK as MG now imported from China, although the company does still employ around 500 people in research and development at Longbridge.

 

Carfinance247 banner


Click here to sign up for our monthly newsletter



Popular news stories

 
Hubcap animal sculptures
The new Porsche 911 GT3 RS unveiled
Audi R8 prices revealed   The new Lotus Evora 400

Hubcap animal sculptures

 

Reid: TopGear like a war

 

Audi R8 prices revealed

 

The new Lotus Evora 400


Comments
CAR TALK
The Nissan LEAF is celebrating its tenth birthday, the LEAF has found 180,000 European buyers.
CAR TALK
Citroen has managed to shave 3g/km off the CO2 emissions of its Grand C4 SpaceTourer.
CAR TALK
Fittingly for such a dismal year, grey was the most popular choice for UK car buyers in 2020.
CAR TALK
Some of the weirder items customers have offered used car dealers in part-exchange deals.
CAR TALK
Vauxhall Corsa enjoys a promising start to 2021 by topping the UK’s new car registration charts.
CAR TALK
Outlander PHEV retained its position as Europe’s best-selling plug-in hybrid SUV in 2020.