JLR ‘cyber shockwave ripping through UK industry’ as supplier share price plummets by 55%

Shares in a British automaker supplier plummeted 55% Wednesday as it warned that a cyberattack on Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) was impacting its business, adding to concerns that the incident is sending a “shockwave” through the country’s industrial sector, according to a senior politician.

Shares in Autins, a company providing specialist insulation components for Jaguar vehicles, opened 55% below its Tuesday closing price on the AIM exchange for smaller companies. As of publication the price recovered slightly to a 40% drop.

In a trading update the company acknowledged that JLR stopping all production since the cyberattack on September 1 was having a material effect on its own operations. Its chief executive, Andy Bloomer, told investors the attack was “concerning not just for Autins, but the wider automotive supply chain.”

Bloomer added the true impact of the disruption “will not be known for some time,” but that Autins was “doing everything possible to protect our business now and ensure we are ready to benefit as we come out the other side.”

These protective measures have included using banked hours for employees, delaying and cancelling raw material orders, as well as pausing discretionary spend across the business. Autins employed 148 people and recorded revenues of just over £31 million last year, according to its annual results. 

It comes as Liam Byrne, a Labour MP for Birmingham Hodge Hill and Solihull North — one of the United Kingdom’s parliamentary constituencies in a region dominated by automotive manufacturing — warned the JLR disruption was “a cyber shockwave ripping through our industrial heartlands.”

“If government stands back, that shockwave is going to destroy jobs, businesses, and pay packets across Britain. Ministers must step up fast with emergency support to stop this digital siege at JLR spreading economic havoc through the supply chain,” stated Byrne.

It follows JLR announcing on Tuesday that its global operations would remain shuttered until at least the middle of next week. Thousands of JLR employees have been told not to report for work due to the standstill.

Reports suggest that thousands more workers at supply-chain businesses are also being temporarily laid off due to the shutdown. The Unite union has called on the government to provide a furlough scheme to support impacted workers.

The extended disruption is increasing the costs of the incident for JLR, which is one of Britain’s most significant industrial producers — accounting for roughly 4% of goods exports last year — and risks damaging the British economy as a whole. 

Lucas Kello, the director of the University of Oxford's Academic Centre of Excellence in Cyber Security Research, told Recorded Future News last week: “This is more than a company outage — it’s an economic security incident.”

A spokesperson for the Department of Business and Trade did not respond to a request for comment. The Prime Minister's official spokesman previously stated there were "no discussions around taxpayers' money" being used to help JLR suppliers.