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Hackett in for Long Haul


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10 minutes ago, akirby said:

They must be happy with his new strategy and new products.

New products?  Just curious-what new products are truly the result of his administration/leadership?   And what responsibility does he share for the FU Explorer/Aviator launch?

And I have to say, watching those videos  of CAP's conversion the thought that crossed my mind was.."wow-talk about the need for unbelievable planning and co-ordination" I also thought..."not exactly likely slapping office furniture together."

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2 minutes ago, Bob Rosadini said:

New products?  Just curious-what new products are truly the result of his administration/leadership?   And what responsibility does he share for the FU Explorer/Aviator launch?

 

Mach-E styling, for one.  Before he and Hackett told them to start over it looked like a Bolt.  Not sure but he probably also directed them to make a high performance version and not just a long range version.

 

Bronco/Ranger.  The idea and design may have started before him but the final design and execution are all Hackett.

 

Baby Bronco.   Ecosport replacement CUV and Trucklet.    Rivian Platform BEVs.

 

Mustang GT500?

 

Explorer/Aviator - he restarted the stalled CD6 program that Fields put on hold.

 

All the stuff we haven't seen yet.

 

 

Of course he's responsible for the poor launch.  It was a calculated risk to limit factory downtime without spending as much as they spent on F150 retooling that backfired.  Again I think that goes back to diverting all available funding to new stuff.

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17 minutes ago, Bob Rosadini said:

New products?  Just curious-what new products are truly the result of his administration/leadership?   And what responsibility does he share for the FU Explorer/Aviator launch?

And I have to say, watching those videos  of CAP's conversion the thought that crossed my mind was.."wow-talk about the need for unbelievable planning and co-ordination" I also thought..."not exactly likely slapping office furniture together."

 

The ones in the pipeline....

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Incremental products that are not part of the traditional Ford product cadence as of a few years ago:

 

Mach-E

F150 and Transit BEVs

Rivian Based midsized BEVs

F150, Mustang, Explorer, Aviator, Escape, Corsair hybrids and PHEVs

Bronco

Ranger

Baby Bronco

CUV based trucklet

Autonomous vehicles

 

All of that is IN ADDITION TO normal product cycles for existing vehicles.   That money and those resources has to come from somewhere.

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1 hour ago, mackinaw said:

You'll need a subscription to Automotive News to read this, but for those who don't, the headline says it all.  For those who though that Jim Hackett would be a short-term CEO, think again, he'll be around for some time to come.

 

https://www.autonews.com/

 

Thank you mackinaw sir. Are you allowed to quote a few lines from the Automotive News Jim Hackett interview on these forums? I don't have a subscription to that site.

 

Great to hear though that Jim Hackett's commitment to getting Ford fit again still remains strong. It's insanely difficult to turn around a constantly struggling company like Ford, Hackett must have superhuman patience and discipline. He's a good businessman, and right person to be Ford CEO now.

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25 minutes ago, akirby said:

Incremental products that are not part of the traditional Ford product cadence as of a few years ago:

 

Mach-E

F150 and Transit BEVs

Rivian Based midsized BEVs

F150, Mustang, Explorer, Aviator, Escape, Corsair hybrids and PHEVs

Bronco

Ranger

Baby Bronco

CUV based trucklet

Autonomous vehicles

 

All of that is IN ADDITION TO normal product cycles for existing vehicles.   That money and those resources has to come from somewhere.

 

The  normal product that got axed under Hackett were Mondeo/Fusion, S-Max/Galaxy, C-Max/Grand C-Max, and B-Max. Although Mondeo/Fusion was revivied as a CUV of some sort. And you could argue that Baby Bronco essentially took the place of C-Max in terms of investments. 

 

Ranger would have been around regardless. It's not incremental. And trucklet might have been just part of Transit Connect program before it got upgraded to its own program.

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48 minutes ago, bzcat said:

Ranger would have been around regardless. It's not incremental.

 

NA Ranger was absolutely incremental, especially the powertrain.  Not to mention plant retooling.   Budget and people wise that was a significant investment.   And I'm sure the incremental changes for the next gen platform were also significant to accomodate NA requirements.

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Most of the products up through 2020 have been set in stone before Hackett was here, but products after this year have some influence from the new guys, most celebrated of which is the Mach E.  But all of the Hybrid programs came out of the Fields administration so quite a bit happened there, including Bronco, Ranger, and EcoSport.  Fields oversaw the green lighting of Ranger and Bronco, although the whole Bronco sub brand idea and the "Beat Jeep" goal was one of Farley's first initiatives.  The Bronco Scout was one of their first greenlit products which had a very short product gestation since it started life as an early Bronco idea and is basically an Escape companion piece.  The whole shared "Architectures" thing was largely Hackett and Farley as well, although it was just a natural evolution of improving efficiency and development and I feel it's overstated since it's still a traditional platform strategy.  The efficiency really comes down to sharing the parts bin for each 'type' of vehicle. 

 

The F-150 and Transit BEVs are all post Fields, as are almost all of the BEV products besides Mach E.  They also greenlit the so called 'white space' vehicles which include the small utility and pickup.  Fields was openly skeptical of BEVs and refused to steer Ford toward them, but he was a HUGE proponent for Hybrids which is something that I think the company as a whole still believes in.  Although as an efficiency strategy it seems to be lacking in some applications, particularly the Explorer.  The Explorer as a whole seems to be the victim of a big expensive idea that benefits Lincoln more than Ford.

 

I'm curious to see what happens to Ford performance and Lincoln, all Fields priorities that are now fully in the hands of the new guys.  I have a feeling Ford's new priorities are going to be Bronco Brand, Mustang Brand, and Pickups.  I see performance focus shifting to Mustang branded vehicles while ST will obviously stay awhile as a side-benefit of Lincoln as "Sport" was before.  Lincoln....who knows, their investments have been generous for their sales volume so I'm wondering where we go from here.  Obviously building a Lincoln flagship from a Rivian investment shows me it's still very important.  

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1 hour ago, rperez817 said:

Thank you mackinaw sir. Are you allowed to quote a few lines from the Automotive News Jim Hackett interview on these forums? I don't have a subscription to that site.

 

Quoting, "Hackett points to changes that have touched on "almost every aspect" of the business, from what vehicles Ford builds to how it designs them.  He has revamped the company's organizational structure, cut excess manufacturing costs and instituted other structural changes he says are "not always obvious" to Wall Street analysts.  There have been 19 changes to Ford's product plan -- nameplates either crossed out or inserted---since his arrival."

 

Lot of other stuff too.

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I don't think Lincoln is as much of a pet project for Hackett as it was for Mulally but the fact that they’re using the Rivian platform for a new Lincoln BEV tells me that they still believe there's room for Lincoln in the luxury segment and that the new "quiet luxury" mantra is starting to get people talking and Hackett & Co. are listening. 

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2 hours ago, fuzzymoomoo said:

I don't think Lincoln is as much of a pet project for Hackett as it was for Mulally

 

Mullally wanted to kill Lincoln, Fields had to convince him it was worth saving. I'm not a Fields apologist (anything but), but he's the one that defended Lincoln when everything was on the table for cuts or elimination.

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1 hour ago, Harley Lover said:

 

Mullally wanted to kill Lincoln, Fields had to convince him it was worth saving. I'm not a Fields apologist (anything but), but he's the one that defended Lincoln when everything was on the table for cuts or elimination.

 

I could have sworn it was Mullally that wanted to save Lincoln.... Thanks for the correction. 

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1 hour ago, T-dubz said:

I’m more concerned with the quality of product which has seemed to go down (real or perceived) under Hackett. Hopefully he puts a bigger emphasis on that in the future.


It’s no worse than it has been the last decade.  Which isn’t great because it needs improvement but I don’t think it’s worse.  Explorer/Aviator launch is no worse than the 2013 fusion/MKZ launch.

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Early 2015 Edges flooded because they missed installing a sealer. 
 

https://www.autonews.com/article/20150714/OEM01/150719931/ford-stops-sales-of-some-2015-edges-for-water-leak

 

The Mid 2000s seemed better - first gen Fusion, 500, and Mustang all seemed like pretty trouble free launches (and came after Focus and Escape launch fiascos)

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2 hours ago, sullynd said:

The Mid 2000s seemed better - first gen Fusion, 500, and Mustang all seemed like pretty trouble free launches (and came after Focus and Escape launch fiascos)

 

CD3 Fusions were bulletproof and Hermosillo had the best quality of any Ford plant.   It went to hell in a handbasket with the CD4 launch.  I think a lot of it was poor engineering.  From what OldWizard had said they lost a lot of engineering talent in the late 2000s.   The factory workers certainly didn't go from great to terrible overnight.  Escape had similar experience moving from the original Mazda derived platform to the European C1 platform.    I really hope they fixed all that with the new platforms.

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