Once upon a time, the Land Rover Freelander was the best-selling four-wheel-drive vehicle in Europe. It held that title for five consecutive years. Now, nearly three decades after its 1997 debut, the name returns. The model is reborn as an independent electric brand, built in China, but coming to Europe.
Together with Chery
Jaguar Land Rover and Chinese automaker Chery have officially unveiled the Freelander brand together with its first concept car, the Concept 97. The moniker is a deliberate nod to the original model’s birth year.
JLR and Chery have been manufacturing vehicles together in China since 2012, but this marks something fundamentally different: a new standalone marque, wholly oriented around new energy vehicles.
Freelander’s global headquarters are in Shanghai, while the design center works alongside JLR’s historic Gaydon studio in England. But make no mistake, this is no longer a Land Rover model. It is a brand in its own right.
Defender looks
The Concept 97 possesses a recognizable visual DNA. But with its upright proportions, square headlamp clusters and a dominant front badge it rather recalls the Defender family than the compact unibody original.
Gerry McGovern, JLR’s ex-Chief Creative Officer, oversaw the design. His fingerprints, like the big aluminum slab on the hood and the nose, as well as the vehicle’s backside, are visible throughout.
Though the cross-section between the C- and D-pillar does look like the original. At over 5,100 mm in length with a wheelbase exceeding 3,000 mm, the new Freelander has also substantially grown. It now sits closer to a full-size premium SUV than the compact-sized vehicle that won over European buyers in the early 2000s.
Advanced suppliers
Inside, there is a six-seat layout (2+2+2). The dashboard centers around a floating screen and remote display, with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8397 automotive processor running the show. We mention it because Freelander says this will be the first production vehicle globally to use the chip.
The technology specification reads like a who ‘s-who of China’s most advanced suppliers. Huawei provides the intelligent driving system and a dual-optical-path LiDAR, described as an industry first for an all-terrain SUV.
CATL supplies a dedicated “Freevoy” range-extended hybrid battery with 6C peak charging capability (up to 360 kW of DC charging power). The battery also features third-generation cell-to-pack integration, with reinforced underbody armor for serious off-road use.
The platform itself is Chery’s T1X architecture, which supports pure EV, plug-in hybrid, and range-extended powertrains from a single 800V base.
The European market is explicitly targeted from day one. Freelander CEO Wei Lan was unambiguous at the launch: “From its very first day of existence, every Freelander product is conceived and calibrated for the diverse demands of markets across the world. We are not exporting a Chinese car to the world, but we are building a world car, for the world, from the very beginning.”
The challenge, however, is political. All Freelander vehicles will be produced at the Changshu factory in Jiangsu province. Vehicles built there and exported to the EU are subject to the bloc’s additional tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles, which, in Chery’s case, were set at 20.7% on top of the standard 10% import duty. That is a material handicap in a market where pricing pressure is already intense, and where the car seems to compete with its family member, the Defender.
Six models in five years
But Freelander has a few tricks up its sleeves. It plans to release six new vehicles over five years, roughly one every six months. The first production model, which follows the Concept 97, is due to start rolling off the production line before the end of the year. European customers feeling nostalgic will need to wait for 2027.
Whether buyers here will accept a Chinese-built vehicle wearing a Land Rover pedigree badge will be the real test. As a standalone brand, it hasn’t been confirmed whether JLR dealers in Europe will help distribute the newcomer.
