JLR engineer named standard bearer for women in manufacturing
A Jaguar Land Rover engineer has been named as a standard-bearer for women in the manufacturing sector.
Dr Amy Rimmer is helping to pioneer the company’s work developing autonomous vehicles.
Her efforts have been recognised by her winning not just one title, but two in this year’s Autocar Rising Star awards.
A panel of judges recognised the 29-year-old’s work as an autonomous vehicle research engineer, together with her passion and commitment to the car industry. In addition to being named Rising Star, Dr Rimmer also won the Vehicle Development category of the awards.
She said: “I am thrilled to have been named Autocar’s Rising Star. To be recognised for my work in future autonomous cars is really exciting. Encouraging young people to consider automotive careers is so important to the future of our industry.”
Jaguar Land Rover employees took 21 of the 100 places in Autocar’s list of British women in the car industry. Among them was 21-year-old Chloe Crutchlow, who won the Apprentice category for her work on the emissions measurement technologies.
The Autocar Rising Star awards identify and celebrate the British car industry’s most promising future female talent, highlighting the range of career opportunities available. The awards celebrate roles from retail to manufacturing, from vehicle development to communications.
Dr Rimmer’s passion for numbers led her to study mechanical engineering at Cambridge University, with placements at the McLaren F1 team. She then completed a graduate scheme at Rolls Royce, before studying for a PhD, working on autonomously reversing trucks with trailers.
She joined Jaguar Land Rover in 2015 and now works as a research engineer on ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance Systems) and autonomous systems and is developing vehicles which can navigate urban environments autonomously.
Nick Rogers, Jaguar Land Rover Executive Director of Product Engineering, said: “Our growth in recent years has been phenomenal, with the number of engineers rising to over 10,000. Our focus is on creating pioneering products for our customers and, because we have embraced a very diverse range of global talent into the team, we have been able to develop our engineering skills to help us deliver this.
“We all know that there is a shortfall of female engineers within the automotive industry but initiatives such as Jaguar Land Rover’s ‘Young Women in the Know’ and our ‘Women in Engineering’ undergraduate scheme have helped to increase our female engineering workforce from 9 to 11%. Our aim is to keep encouraging women to pursue careers in engineering and continue to attract more women into our business.”
Jaguar Land Rover provides a range of initiatives to support and nurture future female talent. Currently 15.5% of its engineering apprentices are female, compared with a national average of 4%.
