Freight Rover was created as a division of the Land Rover Group of British Leyland (BL) in 1981, creating a new single brand for BL's light commercial vehicle range, which had previously been sold under the Leyland and Austin-Morris brands - (although car derived vans such as those based on the Morris Ital and Austin Metro continued to be sold under either the Austin or Morris brands). Essentially Freight Rovers were face-lifted, badge engineered1st gen Leyland Sherpas.
Under later company organisation changes, Freight Rover became part of the Leyland Trucks division of BL.
In 1987, the Leyland Trucks division of, what was by then, the Rover Group (following the renaming of BL in 1986), merged with the Dutch truck company DAF Trucks to form DAF NV, which was later floated on the Dutch stock market. The British arm of the new company traded as Leyland DAF, with two main sites in the UK: the truck plant in Leyland and the vans plant in Washwood Heath.
Following the collapse of DAF NV in 1993, the van business was the subject of a management buyout and a new independent van company, LDV Group, was established.[1][2][3][4]
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