Ford To Export To 48 Countries Around The World. From India

Cammy Corrigan
by Cammy Corrigan

The idea behind the big car bailout supposedly was to keep millions of jobs in, well, North America. Ford didn’t partake, and hence should be free of moral obligations. ( Not that other companies on the government drip seem to be queasy about exporting jobs instead of cars.) Empowered by a clean conscience, Ford moves production to where it makes the most money. To India.

India is destined to be the global small car hub. Nissan now makes pretty much of its Micras there after production was transferred from Nissan UK (the Juke replaced it). Ford had a similar vision when it set up its plant in India to make the soon-to-be-insanely-popular Figo. Now the world is going to taste the Made-in-India Ford Figo.

Ford had already started exports of the Figo to South Africa, but now, as The Deccan Herald reports, Ford is planning to export the Indian built Figo to 48 countries around the world.

“Soon we will be shipping out Figo to new markets like North Africa, South America, UAE, Mexico. We started Figo exports to South Africa and recently added Nepal to our export destination,” said Michael Boneham, President and Managing Director of Ford India. South Africa is lapping up the Figo as Mr Boneham said (via sify.com) “Figo has been among the top five selling cars in South Africa now and we got an overwhelming response,” It’s also getting a good response in India, too, as Mr Boneham carried on, “Figo in the second fastest car model in India to cross the 50,000 sale mark,” First the Fiesta and now the Figo. I think this small car shtick is no fluke for Ford…

Cammy Corrigan
Cammy Corrigan

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  • Forraymond Forraymond on Nov 09, 2010

    What happens to the jobs in India when some other third world country comes along and undercuts their wage structure? same for China They will be left with no manufacturing, just like America. Not every country can be just about invention and innovation. There will be repercussions in the years ahead. China will not just give away their capital building industries without a fight like the US has.

  • Christopher Christopher on Nov 09, 2010

    Ford loves India. Yeah, Ford outsources a TON of their IT infrastructure support to India call centers. You think those jobs are ever coming back to the US?

    • See 1 previous
    • Silvy_nonsense Silvy_nonsense on Nov 09, 2010

      "outsources a TON of their IT infrastructure support to India"... ...and every other decent sized company in the U.S. has done the same thing. Right or wrong, they're all doing it so singling out one particular company is petty. As I wrote in another comment, I.T. is a poor example because its one of the few (maybe the only) industry where there is a shortage of qualified U.S. professionals. Call center jobs suck, I wouldn't wish one on any American. If you'd always dreamed of a job in I.T. and you've ended up in a call center, somewhere along the line, you goofed up big time.

  • Geozinger Geozinger on Nov 09, 2010

    The Ford love fest continues. The other major OEM's get panned for using India or other low cost centers for their cars going to equally low cost destinations, but somehow it's OK if Ford does it. See this link: ( Not that other companies on the government drip seem to be queasy about exporting jobs instead of cars.) So, Ford in India exporting cars is good, GM in China is bad. Hmmmm...

  • Gregg Gregg on Nov 09, 2010

    The Figo was never built anywhere but India. The "Ford moves production...." is misleading. It's like saying the Ford moved production of the Ka to Europe.

    • See 1 previous
    • Ronnie Schreiber Ronnie Schreiber on Nov 10, 2010

      I don't think that Turkey's been admitted to the EU just yet. The Transit Connect is built in Turkey. Also, the Figo is a warmed over Gen V Fiesta. One Ford means that Europe and North America get the Gen VI Fiesta, while India and those other 48 countries get the older model. The world of BRIC is very price sensitive and it's much cheaper to build a car if the tooling's already been amortized. http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2010/03/one-ford-all-new-figo-launches-in-india/

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