12:37 pm, October 7, 2025
JLR is to ramp up its phased return to production, with manufacturing operations in the West Midlands and Merseyside set to resume tomorrow.
Car Dealer reported yesterday (Mon) that staff were returning to work at JLR’s Wolverhampton engine factory ahead of ‘some production’ getting back underway.
It has now emerged that workers were carrying out ‘testing’ with production earmarked to return tomorrow (Oct 8).
The carmaker says that, as well as Wolverhampton, operations will resume at its battery assembly centre in Coleshill, Birmingham, on the same day.
Some work will also resume in Castle Bromwich, Halewood and Solihull, including in the firm’s body shop, paint shop and its logistics operations centre, which feed parts to the group’s global manufacturing sites.
If successful, the moves will be ‘closely followed’ later this week by operations at its vehicle manufacturing in Nitra, Slovakia, as well as the Range Rover and Range Rover Sport production lines in Solihull.
Adrian Mardell, chief executive of JLR, said: ‘This week marks an important moment for JLR and all our stakeholders as we now restart our manufacturing operations following the cyber incident.
‘From tomorrow, we will welcome back our colleagues at our engine production plant in Wolverhampton, shortly followed by our colleagues making our world-class cars at Nitra and Solihull.
‘Our suppliers are central to our success, and today we are launching a new financing arrangement that will enable us to pay our suppliers early, using the strength of our balance sheet to support their cash flows.’
‘We know there is much more to do, but our recovery is firmly underway,’ he added.
The carmaker also unveiled plans for a new financing scheme for struggling suppliers to fast-track payments, with cash up-front for qualifying firms suffering from the fallout of the hack.
The extended support package will see suppliers paid much faster than under the usual payment terms, by as much as 120 days early.
It will start with qualifying JLR suppliers seen as critical to the restart of production, before being expanded to cover some non-production suppliers who have also been affected.
JLR has also vowed to pay back financing costs for those JLR suppliers who use the scheme during the restart phase.
The announcement comes after the government agreed to underwrite a £1.5bn loan to support supply chain companies who had been affected by the cyberattack.
Further details of the next steps of JLR’s ‘controlled restart’, including its Halewood plant in Merseyside, are set to become clearer over the coming days.
The firm has also said it will also publish second-quarter results later on today.
