Ford buys Land Rover from BMW

Ford buys Land Rover from BMW

DETROIT, MAR 17: Ford Motor Co said on Friday it had agreed to buy Land Rover sport utility vehicles for three billion euros in cash from German luxury automaker BMW. The Land Rover brand will join other luxury marques - Jaguar, Volvo, Lincoln, Mercury and Aston Martin - in the world number two car maker's Premier Automotive Group.

Pending the signing of a definitive agreement, due diligence by Ford and regulatory approval, Nasser expects the deal to close by the third quarter. Ford and BMW's boards authorised the deal on Thursday.

The deal, which Nasser said developed over the last few weeks after Ford approached BMW, comes a year after the US automaker bought the car operations of Sweden's Volvo for $6.45 billion. Ford also has expressed interest in bidding on Daewoo Motor Co Ltd, a struggling South Korean automaker.

Last year, Land Rover, which employs 12,000 people worldwide, accounted for 177,800 sales worldwide, an increase of 7.4 per cent over the previous year, and sales should reach 200,000 this year. In the United States, Land Rover's second-largest market behind Britain, sales rose 37.1 per cent last year to 29,380 vehicles.