Ford’s product guru, veteran of tech heavyweights, riffs on Blue Oval’s electrified future

Dearborn — Across the room from Ford Motor Co. Product Development chief Doug Field was a pile of two-dozen auto parts, each with its own small computer and software written by the parts manufacturer.

Field was hired away from running Apple Inc.’s secret auto project two years ago, and before that served as Tesla Inc.’s head of engineering. He explained at an investor event that the automaker is moving to get rid of the pile, consolidating most computing decisions into a central processor running software written by Ford.

Ford Motor Co.'s Doug Field, head of product development, says the Dearborn automaker will be consolidating most computing decisions into a central processor running Ford-written software.

The change will fundamentally change how people use their cars. Most automakers are counting on software services to boost future profit margins.

Field, 57, also Ford’s chief technology officer, talked to The Associated Press about the change and the transformation to electric vehicles. The interview is edited for length and clarity.

Q: How far along is Ford on moving to this central computing system?

A: The transition has happened where we designed the hardware and the software for the immediate user interface, the center screen. That’s gone into both the F-150 Lightning EV as well as the internal combustion F-Series. The next step is with our next generation of electric vehicles (coming in 2025). We’re expanding to control the overall vehicle and control over the autonomy system. There will be software in parts that comes from suppliers that is appropriate. The reason for that is to make it as fast as possible. A great example is firing the air bag. We don’t want that coming back through the central passage.

Q: As a driver, why should I care about this?

A: The car’s a robot, which means the interaction with the software includes pieces of hardware. So something like an Amazon interface where you know a delivery is coming. A one-time code opens the trunk. Doesn’t open the rest of the car. They get to drop it off. That requires an interaction between centralized software and what today is a locking-unlocking module. There also are sensors that we don’t have access to the information. An easy example is an autonomy system that’s supposed to keep you in the lane. There’s a camera. We can’t say to the customer that we’re going to give you a dash cam for free or for a subscription where it’s always running.