Dan Bigman
Lessons From Ford’s Biggest Bet

- Tesla killer. In the Lightning, Ford CEO Jim Farley appears to have produced the first true mainstream EV for the U.S. market—and stolen Tesla’s psychological stranglehold on all-things EV. America is a nation of truck buyers, not sedan buyers, as evidenced by the 200,000 pre-orders the company is already racing to fill. That shouldn’t be surprising: The gas F150 is the bestselling vehicle—not just truck—in the U.S., and that one can’t be used to light your house in a power outage.
- Experience counts. By so far avoiding the “production hell” Tesla had to painfully traverse in coming to market, Ford is showcasing that when it comes to making vehicles, know-how is a formidable edge. It’s a brushback pitch to a slew of upstart carmakers looking to grab the future and stumbling to do so.
- Most important: It’s an early validation of Farley’s $50 billion bet on EVs, his splitting the company into an electric newco and an internal combustion legacyco with nothing less than the future of Ford on the line. If consumer spending can keep chugging along into the inflation headwinds, this massive-margin vehicle will fatten Ford nicely.
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