For the board of directors of the car manufacturer Ford, it is an internal process. A seemingly harmless analysis to find the “most suitable location for the production of a new generation of electric vehicles”. On the one hand, the more than 50-year-old production plant in Saarlouis, Saarland, with 4,600 employees, and on the other hand, the hardly younger one in Almussafes, Spain, near Valencia, where a good 6,000 people work, have to compete for the show. Ford is the main employer for both regions, and fear has been raging in both for months. Because the loser in the race as an e-car production site could sooner or later face the end. It wouldn’t be the first plant that Ford is closing.
The site that emerges as the winner of the competition will be allowed to produce the first European electric Ford cars to be developed on an in-house platform. The first Ford models to come onto the market with an electric drive in Europe are based on the electric platform from Volkswagen, which uses the ID 3 and ID 4 models there, for example. Ford is initially using this basis to be able to enter the electric car market faster, with an SUV or crossover and a lower model. However, the electric Fords, which are technically related to the Volkswagens, are both built in Cologne. Two models instead of the previous Fiesta production and more production should make up for the fact that fewer people are needed to build a single electric car.