New Ford chief: cost cuts and electric cars key in drive ahead
The new boss of Ford today set out his vision for the future of the car giant, with plans to strip out $14 billion (£10.6 billion) of costs and focus on selling SUVs and trucks.
Jim Hackett’s much-anticipated presentation to investors, after taking the chief executive job in May, included ploughing funds into electric cars and focusing on bigger vehicles rather than traditional cars.
The former furniture stores executive wants to slash $14 billion of costs out of the Detroit-based business through automating processes and cutting material costs.
Despite notching up two of its most profitable-ever years, previous boss Mark Fields was replaced in May after a fall in the share price. Investors are concerned that Ford is not doing enough to advance in self-driving cars.
Hackett, who had run the company’s autonomous cars arm and is close to founder Henry Ford’s great-grandson Bill Ford Jr, said: “The industry is staring at the tech companies coming at it.”
Honda today revealed plans to streamline production in Japan — combining two factories into one in Yorii — and put a structure in place to share tech know-how easily to its operations around the world.
