In recent weeks, much ado has been made about the possibility that cheap Chinese EVs may potentially wind up being sold in the U.S., which has conjured up plenty of concern from domestic automakers and politicians alike. With China heavily vested in all-electric vehicles for years to this point, that makes sense, given the fact that in that country, one can buy a brand new EV for less than $10k – a far cry from the current American EV market. Ford CEO Jim Farley has been quite vocal about how the potential arrival of Chinese EVs could impact that company’s business in a catastrophic way, and at the recent 2024 Wolfe Conference, he noted that not even the automaker’s incredibly profitable Ford Pro commercial business can save it from that threat, too.
“So if you were in our business, even if you have Pro, if you cannot compete fair and square with the Chinese around the world, then 20 percent or 30 percent of your revenue is at risk, maybe 30 percent,” Farley said. “So in the end of the day, I kind of look at it from – as a CEO, a company that had trouble competing with the Japanese and South Koreans, that we have to fix this problem. We have to address this. And that’s one of the reasons why John and I decided to create a skunkworks team of new talent. And it turns out, I think the biggest, smartest decision we made as a team, is changing our talent game a lot at Ford.”
As Farley notes here, he believes that the automaker is best focusing not only on its current strengths such as Ford Pro, but rather, on shifting its focus toward low-cost EVs for the masses as a way to counter China’s models – even if they don’t wind up coming to America, as this is precisely what consumers are pining for.
Meanwhile, aside from automotive executives from Ford and its rivals expressing concerns over that potential invasion, the Biden Administration has also called such vehicles a threat to national security, and as such, is mulling potentially higher tariffs or other measures as a way to counter it.
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Comment
There is no doubt that, the auto industry is crying wolf to keep presure on the U.S. government.