Aston Martin LOSES £71.8 million. Sales down – job losses planned

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Aston Martin has reported losses for 2014 of £71.8 million, almost three times the previous year, with sales down almost 13 per cent and job losses planned.

The history of losses at Aston Martin has been the story almost from the beginning, and that story continues with losses for Aston Martin Lagonda in 2014 hitting £71.8 million – up from £25.4 million the year before – with sales down by almost 13 per cent and revenues down by 10 per cent.

It had seemed that Mercedes/Daimler’s 5 per cent stake in AML – and the sharing of engines and electrical architecture – would be the start of a renaissance at Aston Martin, but it looks like there’s still a way to go.

Andy Palmer, Aston’s CEO, has already stated it will be at least 2017 before the company returns to profit, but it does have £200 million in new funding from major shareholders to help achieve that and, somehow, increase sales from last year’s 3,661 (down from 4200 in 2013) to 20,000 a year by 2020 – which is the plan.

A recall for almost all the cars it’s built in the last ten years to address an issue with counterfeit plastics hasn’t helped its bottom line, but Aston do have plans afoot to turn things round.

Apart from the aforementioned deal with Mercedes – and the injection of £200 million – Aston has plans to put the DBX Crossover in to production (and a new plant to build it), electrification (full or hybrid) to extend the appeal of its range, a new D11 in the offing and a restructuring which could see job losses of around 300.

It’s not pretty, but it seems Andy Palmer believes it’s doable. Let’s hope he’s right, but a car maker like Aston Martin Lagonda without a huge car maker behind them is going to find life increasingly difficult.