LONDON: The storied Land Rover brand name is being dropped after 75 years as part of a major reboot by automotive giant Jaguar Land Rover (JLR).
Loss-making JLR has opted to split itself into four units, with JLR as the holding company, and future off-road flagships are no longer to be branded as Land Rovers.
Instead, the new marques will be the range-topping Range Rover, the off-road Defender, the Discovery family brand and Jaguar which is jettisoning its entire model line-up and starting all over again with three new vehicles.
Somewhat confusingly, a small Land Rover badge will appear on selected vehicles inside and out to denote what a spokesman called a "trust mark."
"We love the Land Rover name, but it doesn't have as much equity as Range Rover, and Defender is rising fast," JLR chief creative officer Gerry McGovern told industry website Motortrend.com
McGovern said current buyers related to other brand names rather than Land Rover when describing what they drive. "People tell us they drive a Range Rover, not a Land Rover."
The news has dismayed some fans: "Dropping the Land Rover name in favour of the individual Range Rover, Defender, and Discovery feels like they’re ditching their heritage completely," read one comment on the UK fan forum Range Rover.net.
Land Rover introduced the Series I at the Amsterdam Motor Show back in 1948 and the rugged off-roader has become a byword all over the world for all-wheel-drive vehicles.
Famous owners include the late British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, who described it as one of her all-time favourite vehicles.
The Land Rover is renowned for its robustness. According to a company
spokesman, 75% of all models ever built are still in use.
The Land Rover morphed into the Defender in 2016 after its chunky, sharp-edged edged bodywork fell foul of EU road safety rules.
The latest Defenders are marketed as lifestyle machines, aimed at drivers who want to conquer the urban jungle.
The styling is softer although they retain excellent off-road capability.
