Former Jaguar Land Rover exec to help open UK's largest battery factory

LONDON -- UK battery project West Midlands Gigafactory has hired former Jaguar Land Rover and Lotus engineer Richard Moore to help it find global battery partners, the company said in a statement.

The project aims to open Britain's largest battery factory to supply advanced lithium ion batteries to automakers building EVs in the UK.

At full capacity, the company says the factory will be able to produce up to 60 gigawatt-hours -- enough to power 600,000 electric vehicles a year.

Production is planned to start in 2025.

Moore will be tasked with helping West Midlands Gigafactory to find a battery company to build the plant on a site at the former Coventry airport in central England.

Moore has been appointed the project's global head of strategy. He is expected to leverage contacts made in the battery industry during spells at Lotus, JLR and Chinese automaker SAIC.

As executive engineering director at Lotus, Moore worked on the automaker's upcoming Evija electric hypercar as well as its new electric sports car platform. He left Lotus in June.

Moore joined Lotus in 2019 after eight years working at JLR, where he rose to chief engineer for electrification engineering. Prior to that he worked at SAIC’s UK engineering facility.

Engines to batteries

West Midlands Gigafactory is a joint venture between Coventry city council and Coventry airport.

It is an effort by local politicians and business community to replace the area’s traditional combustion-engine supply chain with a battery plant that could create up to 6,000 jobs.

So far only Nissan-linked Envision AESC has announced plans to build a battery factory in the UK, close to Nissan’s Sunderland plant in northeast England.

Battery startup Britishvolt hopes to build a second gigafactory nearby but recently postponed its promised start date until 2025 after reportedly suffering cashflow problems.