The saga of Gerry McGovern at JLR — the automaker formerly known as Jaguar Land Rover — now looks set to be over.
Autocar has obtained a memo sent to JLR employees on Friday (UK time) announcing design boss Gerry McGovern’s departure from the automaker at the end of March.
In the memo, Mr McGovern said it was a “great privilege” to have worked at Jaguar Land Rover for two decades and is “enormously proud of what we have built together”.
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He thanked the Tata family, which owns Tata Motors and JLR, and with whom he is reportedly close, “for the opportunities they gave me”. Mr McGovern plans on setting up a design consultancy upon his exit from the British automaker.
PB Balaji, who took over as JLR’s CEO at the beginning of November 2025, thanked Mr McGovern for his “significant contribution” to the firm, and noted “Gerry’s creative leadership, vision, drive and passion have left an indelible stamp on our brands”.
JLR confirmed the authenticity of the memo, ending the months-long saga, which started at the beginning of December 2025 when Autocar and Autocar India reported Mr McGovern had been sacked and escorted out of the office.
Despite these reports, Mr McGovern remained listed on the company’s website as its Chief Creative Officer and a member of the board of directors. Neither JLR nor Mr McGovern could be reached for an official statement.
It wasn’t until the middle of the month that a JLR representative came out to state the report was “untrue”. Interestingly the spokesperson wouldn’t confirm if Mr McGovern was still with the automaker.
Although it is now official Mr McGovern will leave JLR, it’s unclear what happened in December 2025, nor do we know why he decided to leave or was slowly hustled out the door.
Mr McGovern began his career at Chrysler after completing his studies at the Royal College of Art. He then went on to stints at Peugeot, Rover and then Ford.
At the Blue Oval he worked at the Lincoln Mercury division, before being appointed as head of advanced design at Land Rover. He stayed with the British firm after Ford sold Jaguar and Land Rover to Tata Motors in 2008, later rising to become Land Rover’s chief designer, and finally Jaguar Land Rover’s chief creative officer in 2020.
It was in this role that Mr McGovern fronted the world’s media to reveal the Jaguar Type 00 concept at the end of 2024. The bold and controversial concept previews Jaguar’s new design language, which will be used on a series of EV models designed to shift the brand from chasing BMW to Bentley.
In the aftermath of the December’s Autocar India report, former employees told Hagerty Mr McGovern was an autocratic boss with an oversized ego and prone to fits of rage for everything from misaligned badges to the clay room floor not being spotlessly clean for his arrival.
His management style is said to have created a tense and challenging work environment leading to a high turnover of staff within the design department.