Plug and Play UK programme kicks off today as organisations join founding partner Jaguar Land Rover on mission to bring innovation through technology, processes and tools to the mobility sector.

The University of WarwickLink opens in a new window, Advanced Propulsion CentreLink opens in a new window, and Zenzic Link opens in a new windowhave joined the Plug and Play UK’s Mobility programme, which launches with a kick-off event at Jaguar Land Rover’s research collaboration hub at the National Automotive Innovation Centre (NAIC). The University of Warwick becomes the programme’s founding academic partner.

Recently created by global innovation platform and prolific early-stage investor Plug and Play, alongside founding partner Jaguar Land Rover, Plug and Play UK will create an innovation hub that is the first of its kind in the UK. The programme will build an ecosystem of start-ups and scale-ups, corporates, investors, and academia to explore the challenges and solutions that will define the future of the mobility sector, create jobs, and help shape the digital economy.

Plug and Play UK is part of Jaguar Land Rover’s global Open Innovation strategy, which aims to explore technologies, processes and tools to accelerate the delivery of its Reimagine strategy.

As one of the UK’s leading research-led universities, the University of Warwick will play a pivotal role within the programme, including:

• Showcasing new research that is ready to be commercialised through licencing, start-ups, and spinouts;
• Showcasing its own innovation ecosystem, the Warwick Innovation District; and
• Engaging with students as the next generation of innovators, start-up founders, and business leaders.

Stuart Croft, Vice-Chancellor at the University of Warwick, said:

“Becoming the founding academic partner to Plug and Play UK’s Mobility programme, demonstrates our commitment to cutting-edge research and long-term commercial partnerships. We will bring our rigorous approach and globally leading thinking to support exciting new start-ups both in the West Midlands and further afield.”

The Advanced Propulsion Centre provides funding and support to organisations building cutting-edge technologies, with the mission to achieve green transport. It also manages the £1 billion Automotive Transformation Fund, which invests in ventures contributing to the development of a high-value end-to-end electrified automotive supply chain in the UK.

Ian Constance, CEO at The Advanced Propulsion Centre, said: “This initiative will encourage collaboration and innovation to grow, bringing together UK-based automotive and mobility-related organisations, investors, and the wider ecosystem. We hope it offers opportunities for development in products and processes to the corporate partners signed up, as well as providing a much-needed boost for tech start-ups to accelerate their progress.”

Zenzic brings together industry, Government and academia to accelerate the development of the UK’s connected and self-driving vehicle ecosystem. It already collaborates with Plug and Play to run the CAM Scale-Up programmeLink opens in a new window, which offers selected start-ups and SMEs opportunities to develop innovative connected and autonomous mobility solutions at pace.

The Plug and Play UK Mobility programme will interact with other mobility-focused Plug and Play programmes in locations around the world, including Silicon Valley, Detroit, Stuttgart, Modena, Beijing, and Shanghai, which support more than 70 mobility partners.

Kieran Borrett, Director of Plug and Play UK, said:

“The innovation required to deliver an economically and environmentally sustainable future for mobility - and one that also delivers high-quality customer experiences - will depend on collaboration between a broad spectrum of stakeholders from across the private and public sectors, from OEMs to local and central government, academia to investors, and of course innovators, entrepreneurs, and start-ups. With the University of Warwick, the Advanced Propulsion Centre, and Zenzic joining founding partner Jaguar Land Rover as part of our Mobility programme, we’ll be launching later this month with an impressive group of collaborators - and there will be more to come!”

Plug and Play UK’s Mobility programme will leverage the National Automotive Innovation Centre - located at the University of Warwick - for key programme elements, alongside other sites according to partners’ needs.

Speaking ahead of the kick-off event today at the NAIC François Dossa, Executive Director, Strategy & Sustainability at Jaguar Land Rover, said:

“The University of Warwick offered unrivalled academic expertise in this sector, and by collaborating with them through Plug and Play UK’s Mobility programme we will be able to develop the technologies of the future. The hub’s home at the National Automotive Innovation Centre (NAIC) is strategically close to our key research, engineering, and manufacturing sites, which will enable us to foster a true Open Innovation culture across the entire business. Alongside the new partners announced today we will help shape the future of mobility for our customers and beyond.”

Further partners to the programme will be announced soon.

FURTHER INFORMATION

Media Enquiries:

Jo Whitty
Corporate Affairs Manager
Jaguar Land Rover
jwhitty2@jaguarlandrover.com
+44 (0) 7384211790

NOTES TO EDITORS

About Jaguar Land Rover
Jaguar Land Rover is reimagining the future of modern luxury by design through its distinct British brands.
 
Our current model range embraces fully electric, plug-in hybrid and mild-hybrid vehicles, as well as the latest diesel and petrol engines. Our class-leading Jaguars and Land Rovers are in demand around the world and in Fiscal 2020/21 we sold 439,588 vehicles in 127 countries. Land Rover is the global leader of luxury SUVs through its three families of Range Rover, Discovery and Defender. Jaguar is the first ever brand to offer a premium all-electric performance SUV, the Jaguar I-PACE. 
 
At heart we are a British company, with two major design and engineering sites, three vehicle manufacturing facilities, an Engine Manufacturing Centre and a Battery Assembly Centre in the UK. We also have vehicle plants in China, Brazil, India, Austria and Slovakia. Three of our seven technology hubs are in the UK – Manchester, Warwick (NAIC) and London – with additional sites in Shannon, Ireland, Portland, USA, Budapest, Hungary and Shanghai, China. 
 
Central to our Reimagine strategy is the electrification of both the Land Rover and Jaguar brands with two clear, distinct personalities. All Jaguar and Land Rover nameplates will be available in pure electric form by the end of the decade. This marks the start of the company’s journey to become a net zero carbon business across its supply chain, products and operations by 2039.
 
To help the company meet this objective, Jaguar Land Rover has committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions across its operations by 46 per cent, and across its value chains by 54 per cent, by 2030. The goals, which are approved by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), confirm the company’s pathway to a 1.5°C emissions reduction in line with the Paris Agreement.
 
As a wholly owned subsidiary of Tata Motors since 2008, Jaguar Land Rover has unrivalled access to leading global players in technology and sustainability within the wider Tata Group.

About Plug and Play
Plug and Play is the leading innovation platform, connecting start-ups, corporations, venture capital firms, universities, and government agencies. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, we're present in 40+ locations across five continents. We offer corporate innovation programs and help our corporate partners in every stage of their innovation journey, from education to execution. We also organize startup acceleration programs and have built an in-house VC to drive innovation across multiple industries where we've invested in hundreds of successful companies including Dropbox, Guardant Health, Honey, Lending Club, N26, PayPal, and Rappi.

About the Advanced Propulsion Centre
The Advanced Propulsion Centre (APC) collaborates with UK government, the automotive industry and academia to accelerate the industrialisation of technologies, supporting the transition to deliver net-zero emission vehicles.
 
Since its foundation in 2013, APC has funded 170 low-carbon projects involving 402 partners, working with companies of all sizes, and has helped to create or safeguard nearly 50,000 jobs in the UK. The technologies developed in these projects are projected to save over 288 million tonnes of CO2, the equivalent of removing the lifetime emissions from 12 million cars.
 
With its deep sector expertise and cutting-edge knowledge of new propulsion technologies, APC’s role in building and advising project consortia helps projects start more quickly and deliver increased value. In the longer term, its work to drive innovation and encourage collaboration is building the foundations for a successful and sustainable UK automotive industry.

In 2019 the UK government committed the Automotive Transformation Fund (ATF) to accelerate the development of a net-zero vehicle supply chain, enabling UK-based manufacturers to serve global markets. ATF investments are awarded through the APC to support strategically important UK capital and R&D investments that will enable companies involved in batteries, motors and drives, power electronics, fuel cells, recycling, and associated supply chains to anchor their future.

About Zenzic
Zenzic brings together government, academia, innovators, and developers of intelligent mobility solutions in a collaborative partnership. It facilitates and supports the acceleration of the UK’s emerging connected and autonomous vehicle sector within the global transport ecosystem with resources to enable profitable growth.

The Professor Lord Bhattacharyya building, home to NAIC (National Automotive Innovation Centre) at WMG, University of Warwick, has been shortlisted for a RIBA Client of the Year award, by The Royal Institute of British Architects.

Following it’s 2021 RIBA regional and national award wins, the Centre has now been shortlisted for RIBA Client of the Year.

The annual RIBA Client of the Year award recognises the role that a good client plays in the creation of fine architecture. The winner will be announced at an award ceremony in October.

The NAIC is a partnership between WMG, University of Warwick, Jaguar Land Rover, and Tata Motors, and is the largest of its kind in Europe and is well timed, arriving when a global mobility revolution is underway, with a new age for transport mobility.

A beacon for automotive research it brings together the brightest minds from industry and academia, to develop future vehicles and mobility solutions. It is home to up to 1,000 staff working across design, engineering and research, as well as future engineers on degree programmes.

Designed by Cullinan Studios the brief for the Centre was for simplicity and strength of purpose, turning a complex assembly of spaces into an immediately legible building.

The NAIC is a £150m investment between WMG, Jaguar Land Rover, and Tata Motors with £29.5m funding from the UK government’s UK Research Partnership Investment Fund through Research England, which includes the development of an Advanced Propulsion Research Laboratory.

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has today (Thursday 9 September) announced the 54 winners of the 2021 RIBA National Awards for architecture, which includes the Professor Lord Bhattacharyya building, home to NAIC (National Automotive Innovation Centre) at WMG, University of Warwick.

The awards, which have been presented since 1966, recognise the UK’s best new buildings and provide an insight into the UK’s design and economic trends. This year’s projects showcase the extraordinary breadth and brilliance of UK architecture today.

The Prof. Lord Bhattacharyya building, home to NAIC, has scooped up the National Royal Institute of British Architects award.

The NAIC is a partnership between WMG, University of Warwick, Jaguar Land Rover, and Tata Motors, and is the largest of its kind in Europe and is well timed, arriving when a global mobility revolution is underway, with a new age for transport mobility.

A beacon for automotive research it brings together the brightest minds from industry and academia, to develop future vehicles and mobility solutions. It is home to up to 1,000 staff working across design, engineering and research, as well as future engineers on degree programmes.

Designed by Cullinan Studios the brief for the Centre was for simplicity and strength of purpose, turning a complex assembly of spaces into an immediately legible building.

The NAIC is a £150m investment between WMG, Jaguar Land Rover, and Tata Motors with £29.5m funding from the UK government’s UK Research Partnership Investment Fund through Research England, which includes the development of an Advanced Propulsion Research Laboratory.

Margot James, Executive Chair of WMG, University of Warwick comments:
“I’m thrilled that the Prof. Lord Bhattacharyya Building has been recognised in this way, to win a National RIBA award is a great tribute to the late Professor Lord Bhattacharyya’s vision. My warmest congratulations to Cullinan Studios who worked with our team to design a building that will inspire designers, engineers and academics to develop the next generation of transport. The Midlands is the centre of automotive in the UK, and the National Automotive Innovation Centre will be the driving force behind future innovation in mobility here in the Midlands.”

James Breckon, Director of Estates, at the University of Warwick, comments:
“It is great to see this new building being recognised and is testament to the wealth of architectural and engineering talent that was brought together to deliver this exemplary sustainable building. It brilliantly draws Industry and Academia together providing an inspirational environment to innovative within. As a landmark building it has transformed the campus at the University of Warwick and is a fitting legacy to the late Prof Lord Bhattacharyya.”

Speaking today, RIBA President Simon Allford said:

“Ranging from radical, cutting-edge new designs to clever, creative restorations that breathe new life into historic buildings, these projects illustrate the enduring importance and impact of British architecture.

“There are a good number of well-designed school and university buildings that are powerful investments in the future, and I am sure they will inspire young people, their teachers and communities. I am also thrilled to see many of these make creative use of existing structures. Well-designed education facilities should be the rule rather than the exception – every child deserves an effective learning environment, and these projects provide rich inspiration.

“Looking ahead, as we design the low carbon future, we must start by exploring the retention and reuse of existing buildings. And when a new building is essential, we need to make sure it will last and serve the future well – so it needs to be flexible and reusable. Long life; loose fit; low energy architecture is the present and the future. It is therefore very encouraging to see restoration and sensitive adaptation feature so prominently this year; with many buildings acknowledging their history, the needs of the present and the potential of their dynamic future.”

ENDS

9 SEPTEMBER 2021

NOTES TO EDITORS:

High-res images available at:

https://warwick.ac.uk/services/communications/medialibrary/images/october_2020/national_automotive_innovation_centre_university_of_warwick_-_photo_credit_nick_dimbleby_3.jpg
Caption: Exterior Shot of the Professor Lord Bhattacharyya Building at WMG, University of Warwick
Credit: Nick Dimbleby/WMG, University of Warwick

https://warwick.ac.uk/services/communications/medialibrary/images/junes_2021/inside_naic.jpg
Caption: Interior shot of the Professor Lord Bhattacharyya Building at WMG, University of Warwick
Credit: WMG, University of Warwick

https://warwick.ac.uk/services/communications/medialibrary/images/july_2021/professor_lord_bhattacharyya_sitting_outside_the_prof._lord_bhattcharyya_building.jpg
Caption: The Late Professor Lord Bhattacharyya with his building at WMG, University of Warwick
Credit: WMG, University of Warwick

For further information please contact:

Alice Scott
Media Relations Manager – Science
University of Warwick
Tel: +44 (0) 7920 531 221
E-mail: alice.j.scott@warwick.ac.uk