Ford to Use VW Electric Vehicle Platform in Europe, Truck Collaboration on Track

by Chad Kirchner

Published: July 12th, 2019

ford to use vw electric vehicle platform in europe truck collaboration on track

Developing electric cars for scale in Europe takes time, money, resources and commitment. Volkswagen has the new, advanced MEB architecture designed just for that purpose. There are other automakers, though, who need to have an option. For Ford, that answer was simple. They already are working with VW on several projects, so it makes sense to expand that relationship into platform sharing.

In an announcement that also included VW’s investment into Argo AI, Volkswagen committed to providing 600,000 MEB units to Ford for a new electric vehicle that’ll be manufactured and sold within Europe. That includes all of the electric components, according to Dr. Herbert Diess, VW’s CEO. Ford’s CEO Jim Hackett said that it would be “built Ford proud.”

Both executives confirmed that they are working on a second agreement to provide more of these units to Ford for a second vehicle that is in the pipeline, though they were both limited on details for that product — other than they are in the planning stages.

The MEB platform is versatile. It works as high-volume city cars all the way up to camper vans. Hackett mentioned that the MEB vehicles that Ford produces will be “suited for European roads.” Customers in Europe expect a certain feel from the cars they buy that is different than what people in the United States do, so it makes sense to build a vehicle for that market there that is also tailored for it.

The first EV, a crossover, goes on sale in 2023.

Both executives confirmed that plans are still on track for building commercial vehicles and trucks for select global markets. Those markets include Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia Pacific and South America. The first vehicle of this joint project could be on the road as early as 2022.

Volkswagen’s investment in Argo ($2.6 billion in capital and assets), along with Ford’s existing investments, makes Argo AI a “technology platform company,” and they are working hard to develop and test autonomous systems. But, before all of that, VW and Ford’s relationship grows stronger with new products hitting the streets soon.

[Image: Ford]

#ArgoAI #BEV #EV #Ford #MEB #Trucks #Vans #VW

Chad Kirchner

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2 of 13 comments

ToolGuy on Jul 14, 2019

What could possibly go wrong?

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Akear on Jul 14, 2019

This is the new American way, which is to let other countries do the hard core engineering and design. After that just slap your name on the foreign designed product.

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Kjhkjlhkjhkljh kljhjkhjklhkjh A prelude is a bad idea. There is already Acura with all the weird sport trims. This will not make back it's R&D money.
Analoggrotto I don't see a red car here, how blazing stupid are you people?
Redapple2 Love the wheels
Redapple2 Good luck to them. They used to make great cars. 510. 240Z, Sentra SE-R. Maxima. Frontier.
Joe65688619 Under Ghosn they went through the same short-term bottom-line thinking that GM did in the 80s/90s, and they have not recovered say, to their heyday in the 50s and 60s in terms of market share and innovation. Poor design decisions (a CVT in their front-wheel drive "4-Door Sports Car", model overlap in a poorly performing segment (they never needed the Altima AND the Maxima...what they needed was one vehicle with different drivetrain, including hybrid, to compete with the Accord/Camry, and decontenting their vehicles: My 2012 QX56 (I know, not a Nissan, but the same holds for the Armada) had power rear windows in the cargo area that could vent, a glass hatch on the back door that could be opened separate from the whole liftgate (in such a tall vehicle, kinda essential if you have it in a garage and want to load the trunk without having to open the garage door to make room for the lift gate), a nice driver's side folding armrest, and a few other quality-of-life details absent from my 2018 QX80. In a competitive market this attention to detai is can be the differentiator that sell cars. Now they are caught in the middle of the market, competing more with Hyundai and Kia and selling discounted vehicles near the same price points, but losing money on them. They invested also invested a lot in niche platforms. The Leaf was one of the first full EVs, but never really evolved. They misjudged the market - luxury EVs are selling, small budget models not so much. Variable compression engines offering little in terms of real-world power or tech, let a lot of complexity that is leading to higher failure rates. Aside from the Z and GT-R (low volume models), not much forced induction (whether your a fan or not, look at what Honda did with the CR-V and Acura RDX - same chassis, slap a turbo on it, make it nicer inside, and now you can sell it as a semi-premium brand with higher markup). That said, I do believe they retain the technical and engineering capability to do far better. About time management realized they need to make smarter investments and understand their markets better.