MG given 5 yrs.
Not sure that I agree with this, and the fact that the workforce were let go by the Receivers won't have helped NAC recruit many of these people by the time they actually got hold of the company.
From Autowired:
Nanjing can't go far with aged MG
AUTOMOTIVE RESEARCH firm, Trend tracker, says Nanjing Auto should have secured MG’s expertise, not its aged roadster design.
In a new white paper, entitled NAC-MG: losing heart, Michael Wynn-Williams suggests that MG Rover’s engineering talent would have offered the only short cut to a future as an independent car maker.
But with R&D to be undertaken in China, the spirit of MG, which Nanjing Automobile hopes to revive, won’t spring forth from the physical assets lifted from Longbridge.
Anticipation ran high in the UK regarding the proposed rescue by Nanjing Automotive (NAC) of Britain’s comatose MG sports car brand, but in light of the information offered by NAC on the eve of the last month’s British International Motor Show, hope has given way to pronounced scepticism.
“While the British car industry has spent a generation in stagnation, the Chinese industry has been racing ahead at a breakneck speed,” writes Wynn-Williams.
“However, the Chinese car manufacturers are not driving this phenomenal growth, but getting sucked in behind it. Only a quarter of car sales in China originate from domestic manufacturers, which, NAC included, have only about five to ten years to become fully independent before they face tougher conditions in their home market”.
NAC, says Wynn-Williams, is at heart a truck manufacturer, and its poor record with joint ventures prompted the move on MG Rover.
NAC claim to be buying into the ‘passion’ of MG, but seems to believe that passion is embodied in the physical assets it has acquired ... a second-hand factory bought for a knock-down price from which it can start churning out vehicles of a pensionable ancestry. What NAC needs is a complete range of world-standard models to take on the same global giants that defeated MG Rover first time round, says the report.
The fact that R&D will be conducted in China indicates that NAC has not fully understood what strengths MG Rover had to offer, contends Wynn-Williams.
Second-hand designs are a distraction
NAC has wasted the chance of retaining the engineering teams at Longbridge, and by not exploiting this British human asset, shows that it does not understand that expertise comes from years of team-based experience. MG Rover’s engineering talent was NAC’s only shortcut to the future. NAC and the Chinese automotive industry need to design for the future now: second-hand car designs will prove merely a distraction.
Not sure that I agree with this, and the fact that the workforce were let go by the Receivers won't have helped NAC recruit many of these people by the time they actually got hold of the company.
From Autowired:
Nanjing can't go far with aged MG
AUTOMOTIVE RESEARCH firm, Trend tracker, says Nanjing Auto should have secured MG’s expertise, not its aged roadster design.
In a new white paper, entitled NAC-MG: losing heart, Michael Wynn-Williams suggests that MG Rover’s engineering talent would have offered the only short cut to a future as an independent car maker.
But with R&D to be undertaken in China, the spirit of MG, which Nanjing Automobile hopes to revive, won’t spring forth from the physical assets lifted from Longbridge.
Anticipation ran high in the UK regarding the proposed rescue by Nanjing Automotive (NAC) of Britain’s comatose MG sports car brand, but in light of the information offered by NAC on the eve of the last month’s British International Motor Show, hope has given way to pronounced scepticism.
“While the British car industry has spent a generation in stagnation, the Chinese industry has been racing ahead at a breakneck speed,” writes Wynn-Williams.
“However, the Chinese car manufacturers are not driving this phenomenal growth, but getting sucked in behind it. Only a quarter of car sales in China originate from domestic manufacturers, which, NAC included, have only about five to ten years to become fully independent before they face tougher conditions in their home market”.
NAC, says Wynn-Williams, is at heart a truck manufacturer, and its poor record with joint ventures prompted the move on MG Rover.
NAC claim to be buying into the ‘passion’ of MG, but seems to believe that passion is embodied in the physical assets it has acquired ... a second-hand factory bought for a knock-down price from which it can start churning out vehicles of a pensionable ancestry. What NAC needs is a complete range of world-standard models to take on the same global giants that defeated MG Rover first time round, says the report.
The fact that R&D will be conducted in China indicates that NAC has not fully understood what strengths MG Rover had to offer, contends Wynn-Williams.
Second-hand designs are a distraction
NAC has wasted the chance of retaining the engineering teams at Longbridge, and by not exploiting this British human asset, shows that it does not understand that expertise comes from years of team-based experience. MG Rover’s engineering talent was NAC’s only shortcut to the future. NAC and the Chinese automotive industry need to design for the future now: second-hand car designs will prove merely a distraction.
