History of Tata Motors India, First cars of Tata Motors
Tata Motors emerged from the company TELCO (Tata Engineering and Locomotive Company) that was established in 1945 in India, to manufacture train steam engines or locomotives. In 1954 TELCO entered into collaboration with Mercedes Benz to manufacture lorries or commercial vehicles in India.
Tata Motors made their first passenger vehicle, an SUV named Tata Sierra in 1991. See the picture below of Mr. Ratan Tata, Chairman and MD of Tata motors, launching the Tata Sierra in May 1991.
In 1998 the second car from Tata Motors, the Tata Indica was launched. The Tata Sierra SUV and Tata Indica car are the first fully Indian engineered cars with no foreign collaborations.
Tata Motors grabs world headlines by producing cheapest car in the world, the Tata Nano
Today Tata Motors have many models of cars being produced in their factories in India
When the Tata Nano car was launched in January 2008, it got the worlds attention by being the cheapest car the world has ever seen. The Tata Nano car is still the first new car for many Indians buying their first ever cars.
The latest Nano car model known as the GenX has power steering and automatic AMT gears. There is also a very good airconditioning system in the car. This is a vast change from the intitial Tata Nano models. Even with these luxuries, the Tata Nano is still the most affordable car in India.
How Tata Motors became international by buying the Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) Group.
Tata Motors, an Indian Company, has made all Indians proud by making a name for itself in the International arena. Tata Motors succeeded in rescuing the British Jaguar Land Rover group (JLR group) from depths of despair, where other giants of the car industry BMW and Ford failed.
In 2013, a period of about 5 years from taking over JLR, Tata turned JLR into one of the most successful car companies in the world.
Jaguar and Land Rover were the pride of the British car industry and these iconic British car brands were in danger of being extinguished forever. The great car companies BMW and Ford Motors tried their hand to rescue Land Rover and Jaguar companies, but failed. Ford acquired Land Rover when BMW gave up its efforts to rescue it. Ford ran the combined JLR group for a few years but did not succeed to rescue JLR. Finally Ford too gave up and sold the JLR group to Tata Motors in 2008. The rest is history. Tata Motors, in a matter of about 5 years, has made JLR into one of the most successful car companies in the world.