Ford Invests Big In Brazil

Cammy Corrigan
by Cammy Corrigan

While Ford are making some headway in North America, their real Western Hemisphere focus is on the growth market of Brazil. Bloomberg reports that Ford will invest 4 billion Brazilian Reals (that’s $2.3 billion to you lot, I only deal in UK pounds) on Brazilian production capacity. Naturally, Ford aren’t doing this alone, the Brazilian government are offering the usual (as yet undisclosed) state and federal tax breaks to Ford. The investment will add to Fiesta capacity at the Camacari factory and help modernize the Troller plant that builds utility vehicles. Ford’s Q3 pretax profit in South America fell nearly in half to $247 million, as revenue dropped 22 percent to $2.1 billion. Though Ford blames currency issues for the drop, soon-to-expire government incentives have been keeping the Brazilian market afloat. Maybe it’s not “Fiesta” time yet.

Cammy Corrigan
Cammy Corrigan

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  • Cammy Corrigan Cammy Corrigan on Nov 20, 2009

    Very nice, chaps. Now can we please stick to the topic of Ford in Brazil?

  • Dimwit Dimwit on Nov 20, 2009

    With GM in such disarray it becomes a no brainer to strengthen their holdings in Brazil. It will be interesting to see what they do in Australia if Holden starts to falter. As the worldwide markets recover Ford should be in a prime position to pick up a lot of sales.

  • Fincar1 Fincar1 on Nov 20, 2009

    I saw in another post here the prices that cars sell for in Brazil...Ford would be foolish not to expand there. (Notice how I used the subjunctive case to get around the singular/plural issue?)

  • Robert.Walter Robert.Walter on Nov 20, 2009

    Since my earlier humourous post was deleted, I guess I will make a more prosaic comment. To remain competitive, Ford has to make the investment in the B-segment ... oh, and i am told that Ford will transition to the new Fiesta and put the previous generation out to pasture (at least that is the present plan in Dearborn). The truck investment likely reflects tooling and production improvements to produce the T6-platform (replacement of the PN150-platform-based Ranger.)

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