Ford is boosting its investments in electric vehicles to $30 billion from $22 billion by 2025, the company said in an investor meeting today.
“We will deliver lower costs, stronger loyalty and greater returns across all our customers,” said Ford chief executive Jim Farley, in a statement. “This is our biggest opportunity for growth and value creation since Henry Ford started to scale the Model T, and we’re grabbing it with both hands.”
There’s no better signal of where a company should go than consumer demand, and with news that the new all-electric F-150 has racked up 70,000 pre-orders in less than a week it seems like consumers are grabbing Ford’s electric opportunity with both hands too.
The company already has one high wattage avowed fan for its new truck in President Joe Biden, who gave his review of the vehicle when he took it for a spin last week.
“This sucker’s quick,” the President said.
Ford’s move comes as a slew of the world’s biggest automakers are gearing up for the race to win consumer loyalty in a world where electric vehicles will become the norm.
Ford already owns the title of the best selling vehicle in America with its internal combustion F-150 truck and it’s hoping that as the world moves to EVs, it can maintain that crown.
Investors in the nation’s top electric vehicle manufacturer, Tesla, shrugged off the news of Ford’s surging demand, with the stock rallying to end the day up in trading.
Still, the competition for electric vehicle dominance is about to heat up with Toyota set to announce new electric vehicles and newcomers hitting the market next year from both Kia and Hyundai.
At Ford, the company is expecting 40% of its global vehicle volume to be fully electric by 2030.
That’s good, but it may not be good enough to help the US hit its emissions reductions targets, according to an estimate from The New York Times.
In an article earlier this year, the Times estimated that sales of combustion vehicles would have to stop by 2035, if the U.S. was to hit its climate goals.