While the Land Rover Defender is marketed as quintessentially British, it's actually produced solely at JLR's plant in Nitra, Slovakia—1,800 km (1,120 miles) away from the company's British headquarters.
JLR has recently reaffirmed its dedication to the Slovakian facility by announcing plans to manufacture electric vehicles (EVs) there by the decade's end. Although specific details about which EV models will be made in Nitra weren't disclosed, it's highly likely that an electric Defender will be among them, with its debut expected in the next few years.
The company has committed to introducing nine all-electric models by 2030. This will include six electric versions of the Range Rover, Discovery, and Defender by 2026. The first among these—and the brand's inaugural EV—will be a fully-electric Range Rover set to launch in 2024.
The announcement about the Nitra plant's future in EV production came during its fifth-anniversary celebration. The facility had to shift from two to three production shifts to meet the high demand for the Defender, increasing output from 2,000 to 3,000 SUVs per week. Since starting production in 2018, over 365,000 Defenders have been manufactured, making it JLR’s top-selling model for two consecutive years—outperforming the Discovery, also assembled in Nitra.
The new Defender's strong sales validate JLR's decision to discontinue the older model, which, while beloved, was costly to produce, had sluggish sales, and underperformed on the road. According to JLR, the revamped Defender is generating revenue that's 10 times higher, a critical metric for any automaker.
Source: JLR
