Ford’s sporty midsize SUV boasts 335 hp, twin-turbo V6, automatic emergency braking and more. Wochit
Plans to build a next-generation Ford Edge crossover have been shelved, according to an automotive forecaster who provides consulting and analytical data to automakers, suppliers and financial institutions.
“We have confirmed the information from multiple sources within the industry,” Sam Fiorani, vice president of global vehicle forecasting at AutoForecast Solutions based in Chester Springs, Pennsylvania, told the Free Press on Monday.
“The current program for the next generation edge has been canceled,” he said. “The Ford Edge is one of the older products in the market but it covers a needed niche as a midsize crossover. It fits a nice spot between the compact Ford Escape and the large Ford Explorer.”
Ford builds the Edge at its Oakville, Ontario, plant, the last Ford assembly plant in Canada. The current Edge model and the Lincoln Nautilus are scheduled to be built there into 2023.
At this time, Fiorani said, no vehicle is scheduled to be built there after 2023.
Meanwhile, a Ford spokesman did not confirm or deny whether Edge plans at Oakville have changed, whether there is future product scheduled for the Oakville plant after 2023 or whether the Oakville plant is closing.
Sensitive timing
Canada’s largest private sector trade union, Unifor, begins contract talks with Ford in the fall to shape four-year contracts.
Ford spokesman Said Deep told the Free Press, “This is a negotiation year with Unifor, and we’ll do our bargaining with the union leaders — not in the media.”
The automaker issued this statement:
“Edge and the five-passenger midsize SUV segment remain a critical part of Ford’s winning portfolio. We have no plans to exit the segment, particularly as Edge sales were up 3% to nearly 140,000 Edges in the U.S. last year.
Since its launch in 2006, we have sold more than 1.6 million Edges in America. Customers are loving the all-new Edge ST, with retail sales up 41% in 2019. “
Ford has spent most of its attention spotlighting the all-new F-150 pickup, which premieres June 25, and the all-new Bronco SUV, which debuts July 9.
Union officials who represent autoworkers at Oakville are monitoring the situation.
The union issued a statement Monday that said, “Unifor is aware of media reports concerning production of the Edge at Oakville and will be requesting a meeting with Ford to clarify product plans past the current generation Edge production end run date of 2023. Unifor and Ford are scheduled to enter into collective bargaining later this year.”
Factors at risk
With fewer and fewer plants in Canada, you have to have your own infrastructure to supply this plant, Fiorani said. General Motors closed the Oshawa facility last year, reducing the footprint in Canada even more.
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“The Oakville plant is the farthest away from Ford’s core in the American Midwest,” Fiorani said. “It being an outlier requires suppliers to provide to that plant specifically, and few of the suppliers’ plants can source to multiple assembly plants. It becomes a higher cost to a supplier, because you have to build a plant local to the assembly plant. With just-in-time deliveries of parts, you have to be nearby.”
While the Ford website lists approximately 4,600 employees at the Oakville factory, the website does not reflect whether it has been updated since ending production of the Ford Flex and Lincoln MKT in 2019.
F-150 and Super Duty engines
In addition to the car factory, Ford has two engine plants in Windsor, just a few blocks apart. They build the 5-liter V-8 for the Ford Mustang and F-Series trucks and the Super Duty large V-8, notes Fiorani.
“They absolutely need the big V-8 for the Super Duty because that powers all the big trucks. Having them sourced in Canada and the potential for closing Oakville could scare Unifor into striking. If you strike those plants, you can’t build Super Dutys.”
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The new Edge was expected to start production in June 2023.
Ford sold 138,515 Edges in the U.S. in 2019, up from 134,122 in 2018.
Ford sold 19,856 Edges in Canada in 2018, up from 19,156 in 2018.
Still, Ford has seen its share of the midsize SUV market segment slowly erode since 2012, from 7% to 5.2%, according to Kelley Blue Book data.
“There’s no indication of market rejection of Edge, so if Ford stops production, it would only be because they feel there are future models that have even more potential, like the Bronco, Mach-E, Escape,” said Karl Brauer, executive publisher of Kelley Blue Book.
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‘Victim of reality’
Jon Gabrielsen, a market economist, said, “An automaker with liquidity challenges has to make hard decisions and cancel some future programs at the time they otherwise would have had to shift engineers to that program. The decision point would have been forced by that, not union negotiations.”
He said, “Bottom line, a future consolidated Ford is going to need fewer plants in order to survive, and this plant is likely to be an unfortunate victim of that reality.”
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Raising the possibility of a plant shutdown could be a negotiating strategy and, also, denying it could keep money flowing for now, Fiorani said.
“Ford does not want a reason for Edge sales to fall and the idea of its production end could turn buyers off. Sales are good, currently,” he said. “However the competition is getting tough. The company already has a number of products planned that could potentially pick up where the Edge left off.”
Contact Phoebe Wall Howard: 313-222-6512or phoward@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @phoebesaid. Read more on Ford and sign up for our autos newsletter.
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