Thursday, August 18, 2011

Jaguar X-Type

The X-Type is a compact executive car which was produced between 2001 and 2009 by Jaguar. As the smallest of the Jaguar model range, with saloon and wagon variants, the X-Type was the only estate ever manufactured in series production by the company. The X-Type was manufactured at the Halewood assembly facility near Liverpool, a Jaguar Land Rover plant which also produces the Land Rover Freelander.Interviewed in November 2000, managing director Jonathan Browning said Jaguar's objective was to achieve annual sales of 100,000 with the car, partly by taking market share from established German rivals and partly by expanding the market segment in Jaguar's key markets.The X-Type was Jaguar's best-selling model during almost all its production run,but sales did not meet projections, peaking at 50,000 in 2003. In the United States, the car's primary market, sales dropped from 21,542 in 2004 to 10,941 in 2005. In the same year, Audi sold 48,922 A4s, BMW sold 106,950 3-series and Mercedes-Benz sold 60,658 C-classes.Numerous car magazine and website reviews were largely positive for the X-Type, especially during the early years of its introduction. In reality, the X-Type used only 20% of Ford Mondeo's components, while a variety of Ford platforms, engines and components were being used by all models of the Ford Motor Company's luxury brands in that period, namely Aston Martin, Jaguar and Lincoln. In 2008, Jaguar director of design Ian Callum said that, despite management denials at the time, the slow-selling X-Type “was essentially designed in Detroit and presented as close to a fait accompli to reluctant designers and engineers at Jaguar's Whitley design centre."The facelifted model was expected to continue through to the 2010 model year in its remaining markets, and not to be directly replaced. On 15 July 2009, Jaguar Land Rover announced that it would end production of the X-Type by late 2009, with the loss of 300 jobs, and have a three-week shut down, at their plant in Halewood where the car was built, between September and December.By this time more than 350,000 had been produced.Jaguar X-Type won AutoWeek's Editors Choice Award as the Most Significant Car at the Geneva Motor Show of 2001.