Indian bid for Midlands legends

The luxury vehicle-makers have been put up for sale by owners Ford with a price tag of up to £4 billion.

The US car giant's board running the Jaguar and Land Rover businesses is now engaged in a series of meetings with the possible bidders, including Indian industrial giant Tata – which bought steel group Corus earlier this year – and Mahindra & Mahindra, India's biggest SUV maker.

Both have opened talks with senior Ford bosses, who want to seal the deal by early next year.

Reports from India suggest that Ford has invited them to meet the management of both Jaguar and Land Rover over the next three weeks. Ford's next step will be to open its books to the bidders, under the due diligence procedure.

The American car firm is said to be seeking assurances that whichever bidder eventually buys the two companies will keep all the UK factories open for at least five years to safeguard British jobs.

Tata, which also owns Tetley Tea, has its own car and truck-making arm, as well as aviation, power and chemicals businesses. It bought Corus, the former British Steel, which operates a dozen sites across the Black Country, in a £5.75 billion deal in January.

Fears of threats to jobs have so far proved groundless in the UK, where senior Tata executives have been visiting major Corus plants including the Wednesfield Steelpark.

It is understood that the overall head of Tata, Ratan Tata, is personally heading the talks with Ford.

The sale of Jaguar and Land Rover to Far Eastern businesses would follow the path of MG Rover, now owned by Chinese car maker Nanjing Automobile Corporation (NAC), which is restarting production of the MG TF sports cars at Longbridge later this year.

At the same time two former Ford executives are leading rival private equity bids for the car companies, which employ around 15,000 people at their West Midland plants in Solihull, Coventry and Birmingham. Jacques Nasser, who was boss of Ford from 1999 to 2001, is leading a bid by One Equity Partners, a private equity firm owned by JPMorgan Chase.

Meanwhile, Nich Scheele, who had served as Ford's president and chief operating officer from 2001 until his retirement in 2005, has joined New York-based Ripplewood Holdings in its bid for the brands.

Cerberus Capital Management, the US venture capital firm that bought Chrysler earlier this year, is also said to be interested in bidding.

Ford, which made a record £6 billion loss last year, is trying to sell the brands to raise cash as it restructures to focus on its core mass market cars. It has also confirmed plans to sell off Swedish car business Volvo.