Hazar Denli - Electric car whistleblower sacked by Jaguar Land Rover

Read the BBC Article - Here

Mr Denli, from Milton Keynes, first raised concerns internally while working at a different division of Tata Group, its global engineering consultancy Tata Technologies.

He told the BBC that in test-driving prototypes, designed by Tata Technologies for Vietnamese car maker Vinfast, he identified improperly designed components in the car's chassis, including its suspension system. At low mileages, some of them were snapping off, he said.

That created a risk that under stress, such as hitting a pothole at speed, the wheels could become misaligned, causing the car to veer to the left or right without prompting, and the driver could lose control, Mr Denli added.

"We saw, for example, the front strut-to-knuckle connection was loosening, which could be extremely dangerous," he said. "It could cause a loosening of the entire structure that could cause wheels to come off.

"In a crash scenario, it could be completely unsafe. It could cause the vehicle to lose control." Then on 24 April this year, a family-of-four was killed in a crash, external in Pleasanton, California. Police reported the vehicle lost control, veered off the road, hit a pole and caught fire.

The following month, US safety regulator the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), announced it was reviewing the VinFast VF8. VinFast said it was cooperating with the investigation. The reports of the crash prompted Mr Denli to publish the posts on a Reddit account, external saying he had worked on the design of the car and it was a vehicle he believed endangered lives.

After he saw the Reddit posts, Tata Technologies HR director Patrick Flood discussed his company's wish to have Mr Denli's new employment terminated with JLR's HR director and board member Dave Williams. Mr Flood told Mr Williams that Tata Group's client VinFast had conducted its own investigation and identified Mr Denli as the author of the Reddit posts: "The concern is if he has done this now, he could do the same at JLR."

The same day he was sacked, Mr Denli was blacklisted on industry recruitment platform Magnit, which told JLR he had been "red-flagged" so any applications from him for other work via the platform would be automatically declined.