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The internal investment operation - 1986 The turning point for car manufacturing in Britain – as opposed to British owned car manufacturing – was 1986, when Nissan opened a new car manufacturing plant near Sunderland in England’s North East with the enthusiastic support of the Conservative government. 2008-05-10 Read more

Death & Dissection - 1988 The patient was dismembered. The government sold off the bits of the company that had a value. 2008-05-09 Read more

. New life as a part of a first class company? - 1994 1994 should have been the end of this story. The story might have ended like this. BMW was a relatively low volume car maker producing a narrow range of excellent premium quality cars. Its strategy was to use the brands that Rover Cars owned – namely Rover, Range Rover, Mini, MG – perhaps even Riley – to build a range of smaller cheaper premium small and medium cars, sports models and 4x4s - without compromising the power of the BMW brand. 2008-05-08 Read more

Strange names – Phoenix and Alchemy Two groups of businessmen were prepared to take Rover on. They had strange names. Alchemists tried to turn lead into gold. The Phoenix was a mythical bird that rose out of its own ashes every morning. Which was it to be? 2008-05-07 Read more

Endgame When the Phoenix directors arrived at the Longbridge plant they were greeted by cheering workers. But over the next four years the group brought out a series of slightly modified old models with high performance engines and the MG label – and concentrated on finding a buyer in the emerging markets of India and China. They failed with Tata of India and with the Shanghai Engineering Company. Why would a Chinese manufacturer want to acquire an old-fashioned manufacturing plant in the UK? 2008-05-06 Read more

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