Rover and Land Rover are two distinct brands. It's not like two companies are making and selling cars badged as "Land Rover". BMW had ownership of Land Rover, Rover, MG, and Mini (might be missing another brand, but I don't think so). They sold Land Rover to Ford, kept the rights to Mini, and have sold off or are in the process of selling off the rights to the other brands.

As far as Ford goes, they have the first right to the Rover name in an agreement that they have with BMW after the Land Rover deal, which means if they match the deal that BMW has with the Chinese firm, Ford gets first right to the Rover name. If it is that important to them, they need to pay up (and I don't exactly think they can afford to do so given their current state of affairs).

Good point -- that part of the story is noteworthy.

Its over.

Careful - they might steal that from you!

Yeah I read this in Wall Street yesterday. From my understanding there is a clause in the sale that no SUV-type 4-wheel drive vehicles can be produced with the word "Rover" anywhere in the name. Thus protecting LR.

I just thought it was interesting that BMW made the X5 an SAV because they owned LR and didnt want to cut into sales. However not long after, they dumped LR (which of course was a good move). So I guess with the success of the X's, they decided to keep the SAV theme and worry less about the "utlity" part?

(and I am not saying that an X5 cannot go off road; but lets be real, its not exactly the lets-go-muddin-hook up-the-winch type of car)

Just another example of Ford execs having thier heads up thier asses. How do you buy a car company and not get the name?!

And now Ford is looking to go private.

"It's so much easier to manage our books without all those nosy auditors!"

Easy. You don't buy a car company. You buy a sport-utility company. Why would they want the Rover car company? Have you driven a Rover lately? Pretty sad, outdated Honda models for the most part, less the Honda build quality.