Deripaska eyes Land Rover and Jaguar

Sat Jul 28, 2007 3:23pm BST

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FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Billionaire tycoon Oleg Deripaska, the head of Russian automaker GAZ (GAZA.RTS), is interested in Ford's (F.N) premium British brands Jaguar and Land Rover, German business weekly WirtschaftsWoche reported on Saturday.

Citing a source or sources from Ford, it said that Deripaska would also be a possible bidder for Volvo should Ford decide to sell the Swedish brand.

The magazine quoted a spokeswoman for the GAZ Group as saying: "We have already announced before that we are interested in growing through mergers and acquisitions."

Another firm owned by Deripaska, Basic Element, agreed in May to invest $1.54 billion (759 million pounds) in Canadian auto parts supplier Magna (MGa.TO).

The Guardian and Russia's Izvestia had reported last August that Deripaska may buy the troubled Jaguar brand from Ford.

Ford of Europe was not immediately available for comment.

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