Thatcham Research has signed a “landmark” two-year deal with Chinese vehicle manufacturer Chery to provide ‘Insurability by Design’ consultancy on all new models launched across all international markets.
Thatcham said the partnership represents a pivotal shift towards vehicles that balance innovation and insurability against a backdrop of rising insurance costs and a rapidly transforming automotive landscape.
“The goal is to ensure that Chery vehicles coming off the production line are as insurable as they are innovative, bridging the gap between cutting-edge design and practicality in maintenance and repair,” said Ben Townsend, Head Of Automotive at Thatcham Research. “We are thrilled to collaborate with Chery to bake repairability into the DNA of vehicle design from the get-go. By doing so, Chery is signalling its intent to anticipate the needs and challenges of the future and address them today, creating a better total cost of ownership experience for its drivers.”
Thatcham automotive risk intelligence specialists will collaborate with Chery engineers to develop recommendations on potential enhancements to vehicle design, based on reporting of vehicle damageability performance against the international standards of RCAR (an association of automotive research centres, owned or operated by insurers or groups of insurers).
The partnership will also include dedicated vehicle research with a view to producing BS10125-compliant repair methods to service the most common repairs required in the UK and European market.
Additionally, Thatcham will work with Chery to prepare all new vehicles to meet the requirements of the New Vehicle Security Assessment (NVSA), with virtual and physical testing to scope ‘theft of’ and ‘theft from’ risk, making practical vehicle design interventions where required.
“We consider this partnership a key factor in underlining our commitment to Europe and the UK,” said Chen Chunqing, CEO of Omoda & Jaecoo UK Ltd. “From the outset we wanted to make sure our customers have the best support throughout their ownership of our cars. Our work with Thatcham as leading industry experts has already seen tangible benefits and will now underpin all future development of models, specifically our Omoda and Jaecoo brands that will be spearheading [the Chery] offering in Europe and the UK.”