McLaren is preparing for one of the biggest changes in its road car business in years. The British supercar maker plans to invest £500 million, around $675 million, into its UK operations as it expands manufacturing, develops new models and, most significantly, prepares to launch the first SUV in its history.
The investment will support McLaren’s manufacturing and engineering operations, including the construction of a new assembly plant in the UK. The company also plans to develop and build its own engines and transmissions, bringing more of its engineering work in house. McLaren expects the expansion to create around 1,000 direct and indirect jobs by 2032.
Fresh Investment After A Difficult Period
The expansion follows a major restructuring of McLaren after Abu Dhabi based CYVN Holdings acquired the automaker. CYVN also purchased a non controlling stake in McLaren’s Formula One business, while Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund L’IMAD is now the main shareholder in McLaren Automotive.
L’IMAD has committed £1.5 billion to McLaren over the next five years, giving the company substantial financial backing as it works to reshape the business and return to sustainable growth.
Before pushing ahead with that expansion, McLaren had to deal with an oversupply of cars sitting at dealerships. Last year, the company cut one of the two production shifts at its Woking assembly plant to reduce dealer inventory. It has since changed its production strategy and now builds cars only after customer orders are placed, helping the company avoid discounting while supporting stronger residual values.
Those changes came at a cost to sales. McLaren delivered around 2,000 cars in 2025, compared with just under 3,300 in 2024. With inventories brought under greater control, the company is now turning its attention back toward growth, and a much broader model range will be central to that strategy.
McLaren Is Finally Building An SUV
The biggest departure from McLaren tradition will be its first performance SUV, a model that is already under development. CEO Nick Collins confirmed the project but declined to reveal technical details or provide a launch date.
The SUV will be part of a wider expansion that includes several new models, giving existing customers more choices while also helping McLaren reach buyers who might never have considered one of its traditional supercars.
“We’ll do it very much in a McLaren way,” Collins said. “It will bring something unique to the segment, which we think the customers will value.”
For a brand known for lightweight, low slung supercars, entering the SUV market represents a dramatic change, but McLaren has plenty of evidence that the formula can work. Luxury performance SUVs have become enormously important for several of its closest rivals, attracting new customers without replacing their traditional sports cars.
Lamborghini’s Urus has played a major role in the Italian brand’s sales growth since arriving in 2018. Ferrari eventually entered the segment with the Purosangue, which costs roughly €450,000, or around $519,000, while deliberately limiting production to maintain exclusivity. Bentley has found similar success with the Bentayga, which has become the British luxury brand’s best selling model.
More Models Could Help McLaren Make More Money
Expanding the lineup isn’t simply about chasing higher sales numbers. McLaren Chief Operating Officer Michael Straughan said the company needs greater volume to lower its material costs and improve profitability, making the expansion of its product portfolio an important part of the financial turnaround.
That challenge is particularly important for a company that has been losing money for years. McLaren nevertheless has ambitious targets for where it wants to go. Straughan believes the company can eventually achieve margins comparable with the strongest performers in the luxury automotive business, including Ferrari, which currently has the highest profit margins in the industry.
“We can equal the best, but we’ve got a long way to go,” Straughan said.
The upcoming SUV could therefore become much more than another model in McLaren’s lineup. If it can attract a wider group of buyers in the same way the Urus, Purosangue and Bentayga have done for their respective brands, it could provide the additional sales volume McLaren needs while helping fund the sports cars and supercars that remain at the heart of the company.
McLaren Customers Aren’t Asking For An EV
While McLaren is willing to break with tradition by building an SUV, it isn’t showing the same urgency when it comes to fully electric cars. Ferrari has already introduced its electric Luce, which received a cool response from investors and critics, but McLaren says demand among its own customers simply isn’t there yet.
Collins made it clear that McLaren isn’t ruling out an electric vehicle forever. Instead, the company intends to wait until its customers actually want one before committing to that direction.
“We will do an electric vehicle when our customers ask us for one,” Collins said. “And they’re not asking.”
That leaves McLaren focused on expanding the business around the types of performance vehicles its customers currently want. The SUV will undoubtedly represent a major shift for a company so closely associated with supercars, but the success enjoyed by Lamborghini, Ferrari and Bentley helps explain why McLaren sees so much potential in the segment.
With £500 million going into UK manufacturing and engineering, another £1.5 billion committed by L’IMAD over the next five years, a new assembly plant planned and several new models on the way, McLaren is laying the groundwork for a considerably larger road car business. The first McLaren SUV will be the most visible sign of that transformation, but the wider plan goes far beyond a single new model.
