I-Pace

Make
Jaguar
Segment
SUV

As classic British premium car brand Jaguar weighs how best to carry on in the twenty-first century, one possible avenue the automaker is exploring is to take a page out of GM's playbook for Cadillac, moving to an all-electric lineup to go toe-to-toe with the likes of Tesla and Volvo's Polestar.

As a business strategy, it's not the worst idea; the Jaguar I-Pace has been going strong since its introduction in 2018, and if Tesla's ongoing stock market rally demonstrates anything, it's that investors have faith that electric propulsion is the future of personal transportation.

Next on the docket, according to a report from Auto Express, is a compact electric vehicle to compete with the Tesla Model 3 - after the pure-electric replacement for Jaguar's flagship XJ sedan arrives next year, that is. Such a model could take over for the compact executive Jaguar XE, which saw its sales plummet almost 28 percent in the last financial year, Auto Express notes.

At the same time that consumers around the world seem to be going gaga for ever-larger vehicles, with crossovers and SUVs continuing to pull customers away from traditional car models, the success of small EVs can't be ignored. Globally, the Model 3 is outselling the Jaguar XE and XF combined, and most everyone at Jaguar, including the brand's Design Director Julian Thomson, appears to be onboard.

"I would love to do smaller Jaguars," Thomson told Auto Express. "I think, reflecting on what's happening around the world, I would love to do cars which are smaller, more efficient and have all the inherent values of a Jaguar, which are a beautiful thing to look at, with a fantastic interior, and are just great to drive - I'd love to do smaller cars like that."

No doubt the idea of a pure-electric Jaguar lineup will be upsetting to many; the automaker is well-known for its charismatic, sweet-sounding internal combustion engines. But compared to alternative ideas that have been floated - axing the brand or selling it off to another automaker, or relocating production to countries with lower labor costs to shrink sticker prices - it's a preferable strategy.