Austin Rover Group

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Austin Rover Group Limited
Fate	Renamed to Rover Group plc
Successor	Rover Group
Founded	1982 (from BL's Austin Morris and Rover Triumph divisions)
Defunct	1987
Location	West Midlands, England
Industry	Automobiles
Products	Austin Metro Mini Austin Maestro Triumph Acclaim Rover 800-series/Sterling
Key people	Graham Day
Parent	BL plc (part of BLMC Ltd and ARG Holdings Ltd) Rover Group plc British Aerospace plc
Subsidiary	Unipart

The Austin Rover Group (ARG) was a British motor manufacturer. It was formed in 1981 as the mass-market car manufacturing subsidiary of British Leyland (BL). ARG was the end result of a comprehensive restructuring programme intended to rescue BL from almost-certain oblivion, and with the Triumph, Morris, Riley and Wolseley marques now effectively dead, the new, leaner car business was rechristened as the Austin Rover Group.

In 1989, ARG was rebranded as Rover Group, the name of its owner. In 2008, Tata Motors of India purchased the Rover marque, as well as former ARG businesses, Land Rover and Jaguar Cars, and the former ARG marques Daimler and Lanchester. The Austin marque has been retired and the Mini marque is owned by BMW.

Please help improve this section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion.

Contents 1 History 2 Austin Rover Group timeline 3 See also 4 External links

[edit] History

Following the collapse of the British Leyland Motor Corporation (BLMC) in 1975 and the stark Ryder Report on the ailing firm, the resulting government bail-out and nationalisation saw the company being renamed to British Leyland (BL).

However, the huge industrial relations problems that had plagued the company up to the nationalisation continued to escalate throughout the late 1970s. The problems centered around Longbridge union leader and shop steward Derek Robinson (nicknamed "Red Robbo" by the British press). Robinson had assumed a greater level of control over BL than any of its senior managers, and his network of union leaders in the various BL plants had the power to end production if he had instructed them to do so.

The Labour government of the time ran out of patience with Robinson, and appointed South African-born corporate troubleshooter Sir Michael Edwardes to turn BL around.

His first task was to curb the excessive amount of power that the trade unions had over the company. After discovering Robinson's links with various communist groups, the company amassed sufficient evidence claiming that his actions were intended to deliberately damage both BL itself and the UK economy. As a result of this, he was dismissed in 1979. Secondly, Edwardes began a ruthless programme of factory closures and sell-offs. The biggest casualties of this were the MG assembly plant in Abingdon, and the Triumph plants in Speke and Canley. Thirdly, he entered into a collaborative agreement with Honda, which paved the way for the joint development of a range of cars which spearheaded the company's revival in the 1980s and 1990s. Lastly, the number of BL dealerships in the UK was trimmed down drastically.

Sales of Austin Rover products were reasonably strong, though not quite as high as the sales achieved by some of the British Leyland products. The Austin/MG Metro was regularly among the top five selling cars in Britain throughout the 1980s, and in the early part of the decade it was the best selling supermini in the country. The Austin/MG Maestro (launched in 1983), was initially very popular, but sales dipped towards the end of the decade and in 1989 it was the 19th best selling car new car in the UK. This was less of a problem thanks to the introduction of the similar-sized Rover 200 in 1984 — the product of a venture with Honda and one of the few strong-selling small family saloons of its era. So in effect, Austin Rover was selling around 100,000 cars of this size every year during the mid to late 1980s.

The Austin/MG Montego went on sale in 1984 and sold fairly well, though it was unable to match the sales success of the sector's established favourites — the Ford Sierra and Vauxhall Cavalier. Austin Rover's executive car, the Rover 800, was launched in 1986 as the second product of its venture with Honda, being based on the Honda Legend. This car also sold well, being a popular competitor for the likes of the Ford Granada and Vauxhall Carlton. It was also sold in America under the Sterling brand, but this project was quickly shelved due to low sales.

Austin Rover's decision not to replace sports cars like the MG B and Triumph TR7 was justified by the fact that such cars were no longer popular in the early 1980s, and many other manufacturers had also stopped - or were about to stop - production of such cars. Buyers were instead being guided to "hot hatchbacks", following a trend set by Volkswagen's Golf GTI in 1976. By 1985, Austin Rover had launched a line-up of performance variants of its Metro, Maestro and Montego hatchbacks. These cars all made use of a revived MG marque. They proved reasonably popular, though few enthusiasts regarded them as true MGs. Successor organisation Rover Group had abandoned the MG badge-engineering project by 1991.

Following the renaming of its parent company, BL, in 1986 to the Rover Group, and the subsequent sell-off of its truck and bus businesses, and takeover in 1988 by British Aerospace, and then in 1994 by BMW, the combine now known as Rover Group was eventually sold back into private ownership and became MG Rover, which lasted five years before going bankrupt. MG production was revived in 2007 by new owner Nanjing Automobile, while the Rover marque was purchased by Ford in 2006 but has yet to appear on any production cars.

The Land Rover marque was removed from the combine at the time of the 2000 sell-off, becoming part of the Ford Motor Company, while BMW retained the rights to build the new MINI which was launched in 2001.

[edit] Austin Rover Group timeline

• 1981: BL Cars Ltd is renamed Austin Rover Group Ltd. Launch of the Triumph Acclaim, successor the Dolomite and restyled version of the Japanese-built Honda Ballade.
• 1982: Launch of Austin Ambassador, a facelifted version of the discontinued Princess.
• 1982: Michael Edwardes steps down as Chairman, and is replaced by Harold Musgrove. MG badge is relaunched, two years after being discontinued, on the MG Metro 1300.
• 1983: Launch of Austin Maestro, which replaces the 10-year-old Allegro. The MG badge is used for the MG Maestro 1600 sports model.
• 1984: Launch of the second Honda-ARG joint venture car, the Mk.1 Rover 200-series. It succeeds the Triumph Acclaim, and in doing so spells the end of the Triumph marque. The MG Maestro 1600 is shelved after one year on sale, and replaced by the more powerful MG Maestro 2.0 EFi.
• 1984: Launch of the Austin Montego as successor to the Morris Ital. This means the end of the Morris marque after 72 years. The MG Maestro 1600 is replaced by the MG Maestro 2.0 EFi, which has a fuel injected 2.0 unit in place of the previous 1.6 twin-carburettor.
• 1985: Production begins at Cowley of the Honda Ballade, which is visually identical to the Rover 200 but uses some of its own engines and has a higher level of specification. The MG version of the Montego goes on sale.
• 1986: Launch of the Rover 800-series, jointly developed with Honda and based on the Honda Legend; Rover SD1 production ceases after 10 years.
• 1986: BL renamed Rover Group PLC.
• 1987: Unipart, ARG's spare parts brand is sold off via management buyout.
• 1987: The Austin marque is shelved, with the Metro, Maestro and Montego ranges now selling under just their model names. The Rover badge is not used on these cars in the UK market.
• 1988: Rover Group PLC sold by British Government to British Aerospace.
• 1989: Austin Rover Group is re-branded Rover Group. Its final launch was the MG Maestro Turbo, powered by a 2.0 turbocharged fuel injection engine and one of the fastest hatchbacks in the world with a top speed of nearly 130mph.

[edit] See also

• MG Rover
• British Leyland Motor Corporation
• Leyland Trucks
• Leyland Bus

[edit] External links

• Austin Memories

v • d • e Rover and related brands car timeline, 1980s–2000s
Type	1980s										1990s										2000s
	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
City car	Mini
Supermini	Austin Metro										Metro					Rover 100								CityRover
Small family car		Acclaim			Rover 200 I					Rover 200 II						Rover 200 III					Rover 25
	Allegro										Rover 400 I					Rover 400 II					Rover 45
Mid-size car				Austin Maestro
	Morris Ital				Austin Montego
Large Family	Princess		Ambassador											Rover 600						Rover 75
Executive car	Rover SD1						Rover 800 I							Rover 800 II
Coupé													Rover 200 Coupe
Sports Car	TR7													RV8		MG F							MG TF
																								MG SV

v • d • e The rise and fall of British Leyland – the car companies and the brands
Marque	1900s					1910s					1920s					1930s					1940s					1950s					1960s					1970s					1980s					1990s					2000s					2008–
Jaguar												SS Cars												Jaguar							Jaguar			BMH	British Leyland							Jaguar				Ford										Tata
Daimler	Daimler					BSA										BSA
Lanchester	Lanchester
Mini																											BMC															Austin Rover				BAe		BMW				BMW MINI
Riley	Riley																			Nuffield Organisation																												BMW
MG												Morris Garages (MG)																																				BMW			MGR				Nanjing
Morris							Morris									Morris
Wolseley	Wolseley
Austin	Austin																							Austin
Vanden Plas			Vanden Plas																																																Ford
Rover		Rover																						Rover									Rover																		BMW MGR			Ford		Tata
Land Rover																																																			Ford					Tata
Alvis												Alvis																																				BAE Systems
Standard		Standard																					Standard Triumph								Leyland Motors																	BMH
Triumph	Dawson										Triumph																																					BMW Triumph