Jaecoo owner Chery takes ‘next step’ in UK push with R&D centre

Chery Commits to UK Engineering Base as Chinese Car Production Nears British Shores

Wanderstayfinder.com – For decades, British motoring has been shaped by European and Japanese manufacturers. That era is drawing to a close. The Chinese automaker Chery, parent company of the Jaecoo and Omoda marques, confirmed on Wednesday that it will open a dedicated research and development facility in England this late autumn — a move that signals the company’s intent to embed itself permanently in the British automotive landscape rather than simply importing finished vehicles.

The announcement lands at a moment when Chery’s commercial footprint in Britain is expanding at a rate that has caught industry observers off guard. Data compiled by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders shows that the combined Chery, Omoda, and Jaecoo brands captured close to eight percent of the UK new-car market in July, a dramatic leap from roughly three percent a year earlier. The Jaecoo 7, a mid-size SUV that has earned the affectionate moniker “Temu Range Rover” among British buyers for pairing premium-adjacent technology with a fraction of the price, even topped the national sales chart in March. Until now, every unit sold domestically has been shipped in from Chinese factories.

From Importer to Manufacturer

The R&D centre is one pillar of a broader industrial strategy. Chery, which is partially state-owned, has already struck a manufacturing agreement with Nissan to produce vehicles at the latter’s Sunderland plant. Under that arrangement, mass-market Chinese-built cars will roll off a British production line for the first time beginning in 2027, marking a structural shift in where British drivers’ cars are physically assembled.

Gary Lan, chief executive of Chery’s UK operations, framed the engineering investment as the logical extension of that manufacturing ambition:

“We waited over 20 years for the right time to enter this market, and our ambition has always gone much further than simply bringing vehicles here.”

UTAC Millbrook: The Testing Ground

The chosen location is UTAC Millbrook in Bedfordshire, a sprawling vehicle-testing complex long used by engineering firms, motorsport teams, and the Ministry of Defence. The site offers more than 70 kilometres (43 miles) of purpose-built test tracks — surfaces calibrated to replicate everything from wet urban streets to high-speed motorway conditions. Chery will use those facilities to calibrate its vehicles specifically for UK road geometry, climate, and driver expectations.

Looking further ahead, the company indicated it intends to leverage the Millbrook installation for work on autonomous driving systems and artificial-intelligence-driven vehicle functions, areas where Chinese OEMs have been investing heavily at home.

Kirsty Andrew, vice-president of UTAC UK, described the partnership in terms that underscore the scale of the commitment:

“A significant commitment to engineering and vehicle development in the UK. Creating a stand-alone engineering centre here means Chery Automobile can develop and validate vehicles against the particular demands of UK roads and UK drivers, with direct access to our engineering expertise and testing environments throughout that process.”

Why the Timing Matters

The arrival of Chinese manufacturers as a genuine competitive force in European car markets has compressed margins and forced traditional rivals to rethink pricing, electrification roadmaps, and supply-chain strategy. Several structural advantages explain the speed of the shift: generous state subsidies that lower the effective cost of building electrified platforms, comparatively lower labour expenses across the manufacturing chain, and China’s near-total dominance of lithium-ion battery production. Together, these factors have allowed Chinese brands to offer feature-rich electric and hybrid vehicles at price points that European incumbents find difficult to match without eroding profitability.

For British consumers, the practical effect has already been visible in showrooms. The Jaecoo 7, for instance, bundles connectivity, driver-assistance suites, and interior technology that would sit in a considerably more expensive European SUV, yet retails at a price that undercuts those rivals by tens of thousands of pounds. That value proposition, combined with aggressive marketing and rapidly expanding dealer networks, explains the market-share jump from three to eight percent in a single year.

A Fourth Brand Enters the Fray

Chery’s UK product portfolio is also broadening. Last February the company introduced Lepas, its fourth marque in Britain, positioned toward younger families seeking compact, affordable vehicles with modern safety and connectivity features. The addition of Lepas alongside Jaecoo, Omoda, and the parent Chery badge gives the group a multi-segment presence that mirrors the multi-brand strategies long employed by Japanese and Korean manufacturers.

Jobs and Investment: The Unanswered Questions

Chery stated that it ultimately intends to recruit local engineering talent and generate jobs in the Bedfordshire area surrounding the Millbrook site. However, the company declined to disclose either the total capital investment allocated to the facility or the number of positions it expects to create. Those figures will matter to local councils, skills agencies, and the wider political conversation about whether Chinese industrial entry into Britain translates into durable domestic employment or remains a transient presence tied to imported components.

What is clear, however, is that the era in which British buyers could assume their next vehicle would be designed, engineered, and built outside the country is ending. Whether that transition produces net benefit for the UK’s automotive workforce and supply chain will depend on how quickly the Sunderland production line ramps up, how deeply the Millbrook engineering operation integrates with local suppliers, and whether the jobs promised materialise at scale. The next eighteen months will provide the first real answers.