Ford boss Jim Farley (60) had previously stated that he wanted to save around three billion dollars by 2026. The job cuts that have now been announced are seen as an important step in this plan. Ford employs around 31,000 people in the United States, where, according to the report, most of the job cuts are expected. “We have too many employees,” Farley said at a conference in February. “The management team firmly believes that we are making too little money from our portfolio of internal combustion and electric vehicles.”
In March, Ford had the investments to expand its electric car production increased to $50 billion. The move is part of an initiative with which he wants to challenge leading electric car maker Tesla. Farley made it clear where the money had to come from: “The financing of this 50 billion dollars is based on our core business, automobile construction,” the manager explained in an interview with Bloomberg Television and at the same time made it clear that “Ford Blue” had to become more profitable .
At the same time, the management decided to build two million battery electric vehicles annually by 2026. Last year, Ford sold just 27,140 electric cars in the United States. Last month, Ford’s electric vehicle sales jumped more than 75 percent from a year earlier, when the company launched the new F-150 Lightning electric pickup truck.
Ford is also making the switch to electric car production in Europe. The employees at the Saarlouis plant feel this very badly. Because on the old continent, the US manufacturer wants to manufacture its electric cars in Valencia, Spain, and not in Saarland, the group said communicated at the end of June. At the Saarland site with 4,600 employees, production of the Focus combustion engine model will end in 2025. Ford has so far left it open how things will continue in Saarlouis. In Ford’s European headquarters in Cologne, things are looking better: Ford wants to according to earlier statements strengthen this location, which is about three times as large, with an investment of billions.