10:05 am, October 8, 2025
Dealer group Vertu has wiped £5.5m off of its profit forecasts for the year as a result of the JLR cyberattack.
The retailer this morning posted an update to the London Stock Exchange, in which it opened up on the impact of the hack on dealers.
The firm, which operates ten JLR sites, says that the incident caused ‘significant disruption’ to its operations, with September trading taking a £2m hit as a result.
However, boss Robert Forrester insisted he was ‘in awe’ of the way dealers handled the crisis in order minimise the impact on customers.
In its update, Vertu said: ‘Significant disruption to operations in the group’s 10 JLR dealerships arose from 1 September 2025 due to a cyber-attack on the manufacturer.
‘The board currently anticipate the one-off impact on group adjusted profit before tax for FY26 is a reduction of up to £5.5m depending on the timing of full restoration of JLR systems and normal trading.
‘September trading result was impacted by £2.0m due to the JLR disruption. There has been a progressive easing of the disruption in recent days.’
In the same update, Vertu also published its interim results for the six months to the end of August.
The latest figures show that the Car Dealer Top 100 firm generated revenues of £2.51bn over the period – slightly up on the same point last year. Bosses say the figure was boosted by the group’s acquisition of the Burrows group in October 2024.
Meanwhile, adjusted profit-before-tax dipped from £22.1m to £20m, despite a like-for-like increase of £0.6m in used car gross profit generation.
When it came to EVs, group like-for-like retail sales volumes of BEVs grew by 82.4%.
The period also saw Vertu continue to develop its dealer network, by announcing the opening of three new BYD sites by November, and selling three surplus properties for £3.3m.
Reacting to the first half figures, boss Forrester said: ‘The group has performed well despite continued upheaval in the new car market due to the Government’s policy to electrify the UK car parc.
‘We have delivered market share gains in every area as the Group trades under the single Vertu brand for the first time. We were particularly pleased to see further growth in our BEV retail market share.
‘Our high-margin aftersales and used car channels delivered another good performance.
‘It was disappointing for the industry to face major disruption across the JLR network following a cyber-attack on the Manufacturer during the key plate-change month of September.
‘I was in awe of the way that our teams reacted to the disruption on customers and to minimise the impact in our ten JLR dealerships, with the full support of JLR which has responded admirably.
‘Whilst the situation is fluid, it appears to be easing in recent days. We are currently working with our insurance brokers and insurers to assess a potential claim under our insurance policy, which extends to the impact of third-party systems outages.
‘The group is very clear of its strategic priorities including further growth in the number of sales outlets, significant control of costs and the continued share buyback programme to drive shareholder value creation.’
