JLR Gets UK Loan Guarantee After Cyber-Attack

London, Sep 28 (PTI) The UK government on Sunday announced that it will support “iconic British brand” Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) with a loan guarantee of up to 1.5 billion pounds to give certainty to the Tata Motors owned carmaker's supply chain following a devastating cyber-attack.

The loan will come from a commercial bank, backed by the Department for Business and Trade's (DBT) Export Development Guarantee (EDG), provided by export credit agency UK Export Finance, to be paid back over five years.

The aim is to bolster JLR's cash reserves following the production shutdown since early this month in the wake of the hack to help support firms in the supply chain, many of them small and medium enterprises (SMEs) struggling to stay afloat.

“This cyber-attack was not only an assault on an iconic British brand, but on our world-leading automotive sector and the men and women whose livelihoods depend on it,” said Peter Kyle, Business and Trade Secretary.

“Following our decisive action, this loan guarantee will help support the supply chain and protect skilled jobs in the West Midlands, Merseyside and throughout the UK,” he said.

The minister said it was a vote of confidence in the country's automotive sector, which stands to benefit in the long term through “landmark trade deals” including the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with India.

“Jaguar Land Rover is an iconic British company which employs tens of thousands of people – a jewel in the crown of our economy. Today we are protecting thousands of those jobs with up to 1.5 billion pounds in additional private finance, helping them support their supply chain and protect a vital part of the British car industry,” said Chancellor Rachel Reeves.

The announcement follows a visit this week by Kyle and Industry Minister Sarah Jones to JLR's Gaydon headquarters in the West Midlands region of England and a tour of JLR's sunroof manufacturer Webasto to meet senior leaders and workers.

“With plants in Solihull and Wolverhampton in the West Midlands, plus Halewood in Merseyside, JLR is one of the UK's largest exporters and a major employer – employing 34,000 directly in its UK operations. It also operates the largest supply chain in the UK automotive sector, much of it made up of SMEs, and employing around 120,000 people,” DBT said.

The department said it remains in daily contact with JLR and cyber experts to address concerns and offer support to get production back online, which is not expected until next month.

In an update issued on Thursday, JLR said it is working to clear the “backlog of payments" to its suppliers by increasing its processing capacity for invoicing.

“As part of the controlled, phased restart of our operations, we have informed colleagues, suppliers and retail partners that sections of our digital estate are now up and running,” the JLR statement said.

“The foundational work of our recovery programme is firmly underway. We have significantly increased IT processing capacity for invoicing. We are now working to clear the backlog of payments to our suppliers as quickly as we can,” it said.

Britain's largest car manufacturer said the Global Parts Logistics Centre, which supplies parts to distribution centres for its retail partners in the UK and around the world, is returning to “full operations”.

“This will enable our retail partners to continue to service our clients' vehicles and keep our customers mobile. The financial system we use to process the wholesales of vehicles has been brought back online and we are able to sell and register vehicles for our clients faster, delivering important cash flow,” it added.

JLR said its teams continue to work around the clock alongside cybersecurity specialists, the UK government's National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) and law enforcement to ensure the restart of full operations takes place in a “safe and secure manner” following a “difficult time for all connected with JLR”.

A group calling itself Scattered Lapsus$ Hunters is believed to have claimed responsibility for the hack. It was also behind a number of other high-profile attacks on UK retailers this year, including Marks & Spencer and Co-op.

Most recently, London's luxury department store Harrods has reported a cyber-attack this week in which some customer data is said to have been stolen.