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justins

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Posts posted by justins

  1. The difference is the product mix.

    Around 70% of FoA's sales come from Mustang + Ranger + Everest with an average transaction price well over AUS $55K.

    Thatt is far and away differnt to stakcing your house with Ka and other low cost vehicle sales.

     

    And I think if FoA can overcome the bad image Focus has thanks to DCT debacle, it may be seen as a Golf competitor rather than a Corolla / Astra competitor. We've already seen Holden announce the spark is gone, with sales expected to come from base Astra, while FoA have said there won't be a bargain basement, price leader Focus.

     

    Problems for FoA are Escape and Ecosport - both booming segments and FoA going nowhere quickly. Escape isn't bad, but Ecosport is outclassed by basically everything.

  2. Word is that Penske basically told them he'd go to Holden if they didn't OK it, which would have left Tickford as the sole Ford team, which would have been untenable given development costs etc.

     

    Agree with what you're saying re it being a bit of a joke. If you're going to give us FP, give us the FP versions of everything we can get our hands on. All they've really done is re-launch vehicles that are already here, but in a sub-brand.

  3. They just had the media event streamed live on FB.

     

    BIG news is Mustang entering Virgin Australia Supercars with official factory backing. Ford "officially" pulled factory support for racing in Oz back in 2014, but with this they're dipping their toes back in - more in an engineering support capacity than an outright factory funding capacity, but it's a start. Ranger Raptor will also be official track recovery vehicle.

     

    Also announced was the launch of the Ford Performance sub-brand in Oz, to sell ST / RS vehicles and the Ranger Raptor. (Hopefully this will also mean we get to see more FP Mustang variants in the future).

     

    Also (quietly) confirmed was that Fiesta will be dumped from Oz lineup, with the Fiesta ST being the only model sold, through FP.

     

    No articles online to link to as yet, but will as they go up.

     

    This is pretty big news for FoA. They're on a roll with Ranger being 2nd highest selling vehicle in the country, Mustang being highest selling sports car by a mile (though admittedly none of their other vehicles trouble the scorers much at the moment), and arch rival Holden struggling to get traction.

    • Like 1
  4. The sad fact is not every market is as performance oriented as the US & Australia, and on top of that multiple countries have heavy taxes on vehicles depending on their engine capacity and CO2 output. My guess is FoA would have loved a TT2.7l petrol, but it just doesn't make sense for what would be a niche vehicle in a niche market (Australia). I also think FoUSA want to keep the 2.7 up their sleeve so they have something different to launch in the US, as opposed to the Ranger Raptor being "nothing new" when it launches there. Whether that means it will then filter through to RoW, who knows.

    • Like 1
  5. I'm so far removed from the US market here in Oz it isn't funny, but to me it looks like Ford are happy to sell less and less "Cars" and focus more and more on CUV / SUVs (I read Hackett has said as much). So while the sales numbers may be down mainly due to cars, I imagine the profit margins on those CUV / SUVs will more than make up for those lost on the cars.

     

    And it's those profit margins that will fund Hackett's grand plan for electric vehicles and the "connected world" that he showed off at CES.

     

    It's probably the greatest advantage Ford has over the likes of Tesla - profit to cross subsidise development of future directions.

     

    Whether that pays off in the long run only time will tell.

  6. And from caradvice.com.au

     

    The Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC) has started proceedings against Ford Australia today, over long-running concerns regarding the company’s PowerShift automatic transmission fitted to variants of the Ford Focus, Fiesta and EcoSport sold between 2011 and 2016.

     

    http://www.caradvice.com.au/570156/accc-to-sue-ford-over-powershift-conduct-ford-strongly-refutes-allegations/

  7. CAR maker Ford’s Australian business is facing legal action from the consumer watchdog over allegations it misled customers who bought faulty cars.


    And despite being aware of widespread problems, the company allegedly onsold problem vehicles to unsuspecting new buyers.


    http://www.news.com.au/technology/innovation/motoring/ford-misled-customers-in-australia-over-faulty-vehicles-and-onsold-problem-cars-to-buyers-accc-says/news-story/11c05121b636e5125936786cffa15ff5


  8. From GoAuto.com.au

     

    http://www.goauto.com.au/mellor/mellor.nsf/story2/0F421D01DC69594BCA258124007E9311

     

     

     

    Impacting some 1400 white-collar workers across both regions, the departments targeted by the decision taken in Detroit include corporate communications, government affairs, human resources, finance, marketing, purchasing and sales.

    The cuts will not impact employees involved in product development – including the 1750 engineers, designers and other professionals at the Victorian-based Ford Asia-Pacific Product Development Centre (APPDC) – nor will they hit staff working in IT, global data and analytics, manufacturing or Ford Credit.

    That leaves about 300 staff members at Ford Australia who are impacted.

    GoAuto understands that voluntary redundancy packages will be issued next month, with the company aiming to have the process completed by September.

    “Some skills teams in Australia will be affected, however product development – APPDC – is already improving total operating efficiencies in other ways and is excluded,” Mr Gunsberg said.
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