Jaguar Land Rover Gives Up On Silverstone Takeover Bid

Prospects for Jaguar Land Rover to take over the UK’s ailing Silverstone circuit have apparently come to naught. According to Reuters, the British automaker has abandoned its effort to either lease or purchase the facility.

The longtime home of the British Grand Prix (among countless other races across numerous disciplines), Silverstone is owned by the British Racing Drivers’ Club. However the organization has fallen on hard times, leaving it without the financial capacity to bring the circuit and its adjoining facilities up to modern standards and prompting it to entertain offers to take over control of the circuit.

Among the leading contenders was Jaguar Land Rover, which – in addition from hosting races – wanted to build a hotel, museum, offices, and a customer experience center on site. JLR’s potential takeover, however, reportedly reached an impasse when Porsche (which runs a track experience at Silverstone) invoked a clause in its contract preventing another automaker from using the circuit more than 45 days out of the year.

JLR subsequently undertook discussions with its German rival to try and find a solution, but having evidently failed to arrive at a compromise, the British automaker has reportedly withdrawn its bid.

“Jaguar Land Rover has ended discussions with the British Racing Drivers’ Club for the foreseeable future and is not proceeding with any plans to either lease or purchase Silverstone at this time,” an unnamed company spokesman told Reuters.

Short of a dark-horse candidate emerging out of the woodwork – and we all know how those hopes have panned out in the presidential race – JLR’s withdrawal leaves Jonathan Palmer’s company MotorSport Vision as the leading candidate.

MSV operates five other leading circuits across the UK – namely Brands Hatch, Oulton Park, Snetterton, Cadwell Park, and the Bedford Autodrome – and is building another at a former air force base in France. “We are definitely interested in making an offer for Silverstone,” Palmer said to The Telegraph a couple of months ago, “and have a lot of confidence in our ability to bring a great deal of stability to it and a vision for the future.”