Ford speeds up effort to cut vehicle platforms

Ford Motor Co. is accelerating its One Ford global product development plan by reducing its target for vehicle platforms worldwide to nine from 11 previously, and by moving the target date up to 2013 from 2014, global marketing chief Jim Farley said Wednesday.

"It won't be 11 platforms" as earlier planned, Farley said at the Automotive News World Congress. "It will be nine by the end of 2013."

Speaking to reporters after the speech, Farley declined to specify which platforms Ford is dropping. Ford officials couldn't immediately say how many vehicle platforms the automaker currently uses around the world.

"It's a decision to accelerate the reduction of complexity," he said, referring to the One Ford plan. "Derrick [Kuzak, Ford's group vice president of global product development] and his team have committed to accelerating the process."

The revised plan now calls for 85 percent of Ford's global sales volume by 2013 to be built on nine platforms, of which five will be global platforms and four regional platforms. The 85 percent target is unchanged.

The five global platforms are:

-- B, used for the Ford Fiesta;

-- C, used for the Focus;

-- C/D, used for the Fusion;

-- light truck, used for the Ranger pickup sold outside the United States; and

-- commercial vehicle, used for the Transit van.

The platform used for the F-series pickkp is an example of one of Ford's four regional platforms.

Ford showed the latest result of its One Ford strategy this week at the Detroit auto show: the 2013 Ford Fusion.

The Fusion will be built on the same platform as the European Mondeo. About 80 percent of the components will be common on all global versions of the car. The platform strategy contrasts with that behind the current North American Fusion, built on a different architecture and design than the European Mondeo.

The One Ford strategy allows Ford's purchasing organization to order greater volumes of common parts from its supply base and to simplify tooling in its factories.

By Bradford Wernle- Automotive News