Ford reported an $800 million impact from the Trump administration’s tariffs in the second quarter, per its earnings deck released on Wednesday. But the biggest news from the report is that it will reveal more about its future electric vehicle plans next month.
“August 11 will be a big day for all of us at Ford,” CEO Jim Farley said on Wednesday during the automaker’s second-quarter earnings call. “We will be in Kentucky to share more about our plans to design and build a breakthrough electric vehicle and a platform in the U.S.”
“This is a Model T moment for us at Ford,” Farley said, referring to Ford’s pioneering vehicle of the early 1900s. It was one of the earliest mass-produced, affordable cars and put America on wheels.
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Source: InsideEVs
The automaker disclosed last year that it had been working on a secretive “skunkworks” project to bring low-cost EVs to the masses. At the time, reports suggested that the new electric platform would underpin multiple EVs, including a compact SUV, a small pickup truck and possibly a vehicle for delivery services.
As EV sales have been uneven in the U.S. this year due to the rollback of the tax credits on Sept. 30 and the nullification of the fuel economy rules, Ford has shifted its focus towards hybrids and its core profit-making gas SUV and truck business. Last year, it changed up its electrification roadmap and canceled a three-row electric SUV it had been planning.
Still, Ford isn’t completely giving up on EVs, keeping at least one foot in the business. The August 11 reveal will be “a chance to bring a new family of vehicles to the world that offer incredible technology efficiency, space and features,” Farley said.
Ford’s EV efforts have struggled lately. It only has three EVs in its portfolio: the Mustang Mach-E, F-150 Lightning and the E-Transit van. At the same time, General Motors has scaled up its EV lineup to nearly a dozen models, with Chevrolet now becoming America’s second-best-selling EV brand this year, only behind Tesla.
Of course, there’s also the competition the automaker is facing in overseas markets from burgeoning Chinese rivals.
Now, Ford will make its next-generation EVs in the U.S., and at least some of them will be powered by low-cost lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries. Its $3 billion LFP battery plant, called the BlueOval Battery Park Michigan, will start producing America’s first automotive-grade LFP cells next year.
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