Jaguar is launching its first all-electric vehicle this year, the I-Pace, and it is arguably the most anticipated new EV of the year. But now we’ve heard from some disappointed owners that some are seeing their deliveries being pushed back by several months.

Dealers say it is due to “manufacturing issues” while Jaguar says it is “prioritizing” orders.

At Electrek, we have been quite excited about the I-Pace ever since the stunning electric vehicle was unveiled and even more so after testing it last month.

Based on its reservation process, Jaguar says that the demand is high for the vehicle and we have no problem believing it.

Some people who reserved the British automaker’s first all-electric vehicles were told that by reserving the vehicle early, they would secure a delivery by the end of the year.

Several of them have now reached out to Electrek to say that their deliveries have been pushed significantly as their local Jaguar dealers blamed the issue on manufacturing delays.

We contacted Jaguar over the issue and the automaker says that it still plans for customer production to start “late this summer”, but it confirmed that some customers are experiencing delays due to “prioritization”:

“In some instances individual customers may have been informed of a delay regarding their order. This will be due to prioritisation of market specific orders to best meet the exceptional demand.”

In some cases, that “prioritization” is having quite a significant impact.

A reservation holder based in the UK told Electrek that he placed a £1,000 deposit on March 5th, 2018. At the time, we didn’t have all the details about the vehicle yet, but he was quite interested and told that by placing a deposit right then, it would secure a 2018 delivery.

In May, he was invited to see the car at his local dealership and configure his order: an I-Pace SE in metallic red, std metal roof, std coil suspension, upgraded Matrix LED lights, heads-up display, and driver assist package.

At that time, he was given a build date of August 31 and a delivery to the dealer for September 28 in 2018 as originally promised.

July 20 was the last day for him to modify the order, which he didn’t want to do, but he still called the dealer to make sure everything was in order and it was then that they informed him of the “manufacturing delay” and gave him a new February 6th delivery date – over 4 months after his original delivery date.

We received similar reports from people with I-Pace SUVs on order with 3 to 4 months delays.

Jaguar says that the first customer deliveries are still planned to start “late this summer”:

“After the successful launch of I-PACE, Jaguar’s all-electric performance SUV, production is now focussed on meeting the exceptional customer demand. Since launch, we have confirmed that customer deliveries will be taking place from late summer of this year and this is still the correct timeline.”

As for the “prioritization”, the automaker didn’t confirm it, but none of the orders that we have seen being delayed are for the First Edition, which starts at $86,895 instead of $70,495, like the standard version.

A source familiar with the matter told Electrek that Jaguar’s supply of Matrix LED headlights are actually limited and the company might be pushing orders of non-First Edition vehicles in order to focus on the First Edition vehicles which need to be 2019 model year.

Jaguar is not assembling its first all-electric vehicle itself. The British automaker hired Magna Steyr to assemble the I-Pace at its Graz factory in Austria. Production for customers is expected to start in the coming months.

Electrek’s Take

As we suspected for a while now, the I-Pace is going to be another production constrained electric vehicle – meaning that demand is going to be much higher than what Jaguar and its production partner are able to deliver.

These delays look like the first concrete example of that as I suspect that Jaguar is seeing higher than anticipated demand for the higher-end version of the I-Pace, like the First Edition, and now it has to delay other orders.

The situation is not unlike what is happening with the Model 3, which Tesla started delivering with the higher-end version first.

But Tesla is ramping production up to meet demand and it will be interesting to see how Jaguar reacts if the I-Pace becomes as popular as I think it will be.

The British automaker has never been an extremely high volume automaker, but it has consistently produced over 100,000 vehicles per year.

As for the planned production of the I-Pace, we have heard anything from 10,000 to 30,000 units per year.

With Waymo having ordered 20,000 units alone over the next few years, I think Jaguar should be encouraged to figure out a significant production ramp to meet the demand from partners and customers.

What do you think? Let us know in the comment section below.

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