Premier Automotive Group
Coordinates: 33°39′26″N 117°44′55″W / 33.6573338°N 117.7485857°W The Premier Automotive Group (PAG) was an organisational division within the Ford Motor Company formed in 1999 to oversee the business operations of Ford's high-end automotive marques. The PAG was gradually dismantled from 2006 to 2010 with the divestiture of its constituent brands.
The Premier Automotive Group was formed in 1999 under then-CEO Jacques Nasser. It grew to include responsibility for the Lincoln, Mercury, Aston Martin, Jaguar, Land Rover and Volvo brands. By 2004, Ford had spent (by one estimate) $17 billion building on acquisitions to build up PAG.
Lincoln and Mercury were returned to Ford direct control in 2002. Lincoln's headquarters had been merged into PAG's North American office, where it was run by a German executive who was based in London, England.
The four other marques in the PAG, Aston Martin, Jaguar, Land Rover and Volvo, were essentially completely different car companies with their own unique markets and dealer networks, so there were few synergies that could be achieved by combining them under one division. Ford attempted to push these brands to share parts and engineering in order to cut costs. This made some vehicles too similar to mass-market Fords, notably the Jaguar X-Type which was a capable compact executive car yet its reputation suffered mainly because it shared a platform with the Ford Mondeo. While Volvo had been one of the more successful entry-level luxury brands in the United States with the Volvo 740/940 and S70 when it was independent, it lost market share to the German luxury marques like BMW and Mercedes-Benz who had expanded their entry-level offerings extensively.
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