On Wednesday, Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) unveiled its new F-Type sports car, which has two firsts to its credit --- it is the first two-seater from Jaguar in last five decades; and marks the first noteworthy Jaguar design under Indian automaker Tata which acquired JLR in 2008 in a $2.3 billion deal.

The production-ready new Jaguar F-Type will first come in the soft-top version and then the coupe; and will be available in three models: the F-Type, the F-Type S, and the F-Type V8 S --- all of which will be roadsters.

Priced at £58,500, the normal F-Type will be the base model of Jaguar’s new sports car; and it will be powered by the new supercharged 3.0-litre V6 engine’s 340bhp version.

Of the other two models, the F-Type S will boasts a 380bhp version of the same engine as the normal F-Type; while the F-Type V8 S will be powered by a new 495bhp, 5-liter V8 engine. The cost of the two models will be £67,500 and £79,950 respectively.

All the three F-Type models – the deliveries of which will begin by mid-2013 - will use an eight-speed automatic transmission with closely-mounded ratios, controllable either by the paddles on the steering wheel or by the centre console’s “SportShift” selector.

Noting that the new Jaguar F-Type “sounds like a sports car,” which it essentially should, Jaguar historian Philip Porter said that the car appears to be “a combination, like the great Jaguars of the past, of sculptural styling, great engineering and superb performance.”