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The origins of the UK automotive industry date back to the final years of the 19th century. By the 1950s, the UK was the second-largest manufacturer of cars in the world (after the United States), and the largest exporter. [4]
- History of The British Car Industry
- British Leyland
- Japanese and European Advances
- The 1980s Was A New Era For The British Car Industry
- The End of British-Owned Volume Automaking
- Today’S British Automotive Industry
- Twin Parallel British Automotive Industries
- Bespoke vs Brexit
“This is a long and incredibly complex story that starts in the late 1960s with a series of ill-fated mergers and ends with MG Rover – the UK’s last volume car manufacturer – collapsing in 2003,” said Harrison. “It was a series of factors. Although the industry could have survived one or more of these, it couldn’t survive them all.” With Japanese a...
Increasingly, the British automotive industry was dominated by a multi-brand conglomerate which gradually absorbed more and more of the country’s car companies. Called The British Motor Corporation (BMC) upon formation in 1952, it comprised the Austin, Morris, MG, Riley and Wolseley marques. In 1966, BMC joined with Jaguar to become British Motor H...
“At the time every other car sold in the UK was made by BL. There was a feeling that the British public would buy anything, as long as it was British,” he continued. “The Japanese with their well-priced, well built, and reliable models were waiting in the wings. And, attractive and practical European hatchbacks, in the shape of the Renault 5 and Vo...
After Margaret Thatcher became Britain’s Prime Minister in 1979, BL factories started closing and its brands (including Morris) began disappearing. Foreign carmakers continued to eat into the British market during the 1980s and, in a sign of things to come, Japanese company Nissanopened a factory near Sunderland, in the northeast of England, in 198...
The BMWtakeover meant that, for the first time in 112 years, the UK no longer had a British-owned volume automaker. But the German company had underestimated the investment required to renew Rover’s product lines, revamp its factories, and address engine reliability issues. After just six years, it sold the firm for a nominal ₤10 (about $12.50 at t...
But the 21st-century UK auto industry hasn’t been all doom and gloom. High-end British marques such as Lotus, Aston Martin, Jaguar, and McLaren (which remains Brit-owned) continue to enjoy global reputations of excellence. And, the UK is still a major automaker, producing nearly 1.3 million passenger cars in 2019. It just enjoys a much smaller slic...
As Harrison explained, there are now effectively two very different British car industries coexisting. One specializes in expensive, and even one-off, cars for very wealthy clients. The other being volume-manufactures vehicles principally for Japanese companies like Toyota, Honda and Nissan. “Nissan’s huge factory in Sunderland …not only exports ac...
The UK remains revered for the bespoke craftsmanship and technical prowess of its automotive sector. As evidenced by seven of the leading Formula 1 racing teams being headquartered there. But, what happens next for the British car industry may depend more upon politics than on anything the country’s designers, engineers, and auto workers can achiev...
Feb 22, 2019 · In this quick history of the British car industry, economist Dan Coffey explains how a once thriving British-owned car manufacturing industry, largely disappeared. From its heyday in the 1960s...
The automotive industry in the United Kingdom has faced various challenges in 2021 and 2022. The Brexit transition ended on January 1, 2021, making the industry grapple with new trade rules...
Apr 30, 2022 · This short essay addresses the history of the British automotive industry from a business and governmental perspective, with particular attention to the watershed years of the 1970s and 1980s, which heralded the demise of domestic carmakers.
- Marco Schito
Dec 19, 2023 · In the mid-20th century, the automobile manufacturing industry in the United Kingdom (UK) was the second largest in the world. Today, production mainly focuses on a few remaining British...
May 15, 2009 · At the industry's peak in the 1960s, a million people made cars in the U.K. — five percent of the country's total workforce — with suppliers and salesrooms swelling that number. British...
