Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) announced its plans to launch a production facility in Saudi Arabia after they signed a Letter of Intent today with the Saudi government. Well, technically it’s Tata’s idea – Tata Motors owns JLR – who also made the Brits make a joint venture with China’s Chery Automotive a few weeks ago.

It’s not a done deal yet. Both parties have to agree on the terms of this partnership only after a thorough and detailed feasibility study together, to determine the viability of setting up an automotive facility. Saudi Arabia is not really famous for making anything apart form oil and date, but you have to start somewhere, right?

Good news is, if they JLR ends up making the factory and produce cars in Saudi, they won’t be short of cash. Arabs like to have the best of everything, so LR can actually make a world class factory production plant in there. Also because of Arabia’s strategic location, they could use it as a hub to distribute their products across Asia.

Dr Ralf Speth, Chief Executive of Jaguar Land Rover, said: “We are committed to further international partnerships to meet record demand for our highly sought after vehicles. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is an attractive potential development option, complementing our existing advanced facilities in Britain and recent manufacturing plans to expand in other countries including India and China.”