Jaguar Land Rover electric race car won its first Formula E Teams title on Sunday at London’s unique ExCel Centre track which focused on indoor and outdoor racing. This victory of Jaguar electric race car shows more than eight years of hard work since the luxury carmaker came into electric racing.
However the win was bittersweet for Jaguar as their New Zealand drivers Nick Cassidy and Mitch Evans missed out on winning the driver’s championship leading to a heartbreak in the team’s VIP area. Despite the initial disappointment the team celebrated their hard-earned victory of Jaguar electric race car
Jaguar Land Rover electric race car
Owning a racing team offers clear advantages for manufacturers. It rejuvenate an old brand especially the one known for speed and innovation. Moreover, on the race day the manufacturer has a golden opportunity to showcase their future branded cars and their performance in the race.
Aston Martin’s boss Lawrence Stroll told this at the Financial Times Future of the Car conference last year. He revealed that his company sold 300 to 400 of its Vantage F1 edition cars because a replica was featured as F1’s safety car. This brought in around $80 million in revenue.
More importantly racing serves as a test bed for future car technologies. Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) is now committed to producing only electric cars from next year and has chosen Formula E as their testing ground. JLR appointed James Barclay as the electric racing team’s first principal in 2015 when he and his team started from scratch. “We wanted to use it as a real-world testbed for EV technology,” Barclay said at a recent roundtable discussion.
After eight years in the racing, the carmaker is now reaping the benefits of these innovations. Last year at the Monaco E-Prix the team tested a new transmission fluid developed by Castrol. Silicon carbide semiconductor technology which was first used in Jaguar’s 2017 Formula E car was introduced to commercial models in 2021.
Barclay explained, “Racing pushes you to innovate more than regular development because you have to beat the competition.”
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Future Innovations
Barclay estimates that it takes about four years for track discoveries to make their way into commercial cars as was the case with their carbide technology. This timeline is supported by their partnership with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) whose parent company also owns JLR.
TCS previously had a presence in F1 through Ferrari but shifted focus to endurance sports sponsoring marathons in London and New York. Now they partner with Jaguar in Formula E. TCS has developed a “digital twin” for JLR which allows the team to run simulations with digital copies of their cars and drivers. “The technology in the car is super important,” says Abhinav Kumar, TCS’s global chief marketing officer.
According to Barclay all the innovations from Jaguar and TCS will result in faster, more efficient, and quicker-charging cars. Last Sunday was the last outing for the Jaguar I Type 6 Formula E car making way for a more advanced version. Soon the advanced technology used in Jaguar’s race cars like the powertrain refined oil and new software will be in Jaguars on roads everywhere.
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