The percentage of the world’s population with a disability can also count on technological tools, in the field of electromobility, that will help make their day-to-day lives easier.

In this sense, the giant of the automotive industry, Ford, developed a charging station for electrified cars that, through a robotic innovation, allows people with special conditions to connect their car.

How does it Work?

While it is true that complex technological mechanisms have been applied for this product, the way it is used, as explained by Ford, is quite simple. The first step is to activate the FordPass application on a mobile device or in the car, which opens a cover on the charging station; subsequently, a robotic arm extends towards the car’s charging port, guided by a small camera.

Thus, drivers, without getting out of their car, can monitor the progress through the app. When charging is complete, the arm automatically returns to the charging station.

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According to Ford of Europe Research Engineer Birger Fricke, the company is committed to ensuring freedom of movement and, at the moment, refueling or charging a vehicle can be a big problem for some drivers.

 “The robotic charging station could be an additional convenience for some people, but absolutely essential for others. In the future, refueling technology could be a fully automated process, with drivers sending autonomous vehicles to refuel without the need for a human operator,” he argued.

Ford clarified that after undergoing laboratory tests, it began real-world testing of the new robotic charging system created by the University of Dortmund, Germany, which could be installed in accessible parking spaces, parking lots or private homes.

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The move was made jointly by the company’s CEO, Jim Farley, and the former head of Apple’s car project, Doug Field. The investment will be spread over the next five to ten years and will include the conversion of existing factories around the world for the production of electric vehicles.

The brand is planning a major reorganization to prepare for the electric future, using Tesla’s success as a roadmap and expanding line items to meet 2030 electrification targets.

Strategic Moves

The new plan also calls for a new organizational chart for Ford, including the hiring of an unspecified number of engineers who specialize in disciplines relatively new to the company, such as battery chemistry, artificial intelligence and electric vehicle software.

In addition, Farley and Field want to boost services offered by the firm to vehicle owners, a business that could generate $20 billion a year in revenue.

That could include selling drivers software to improve their cars’ performance or getting more business at the automaker’s dealership service bays, which see 90% of owners go elsewhere for maintenance after their warranties expire.

Within auto giant Ford, they have also considered splitting or diversifying part of their electric vehicle business in order to capture some of the valuations the market is assigning to electric vehicle companies. The spin-off would involve lower volume electrified cars, while the legacy business would continue to focus on mass market prototypes.

All these moves are part of the “Ford+” plan, aimed at making investors value it more as a technology company that adapts to the new era of innovations that also contribute to environmental protection and climate change mitigation.

Written by I Jhonattan González

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The automotive giant’s CEO, Jim Farley, expects the brand to become the second largest producer of electrified cars in the United States behind Tesla in just two years, not taking into account the significant increase to manufacturing that the Blue Oval City EV complex in Tennessee may bring about.

Specifically, Ford plans to increase its EV production capacity to 600,000 units globally by 2023. Farley said the new challenge would double the number of cars that the company had initially expected to produce over the next 24 months.

Models on Schedule

Manufacturing is slated to be split among Ford’s first three electric vehicles: the Mustang Mach-E, F-150 Lightning and E-Transit. Production would take place once operation begins at the newly announced assembly plant.

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“The demand is much higher than we expected. It’s a really new experience for this large company, which is trying to be agile. We had to approach it very differently than how we’ve done capacity planning,” Farley explained.

In relation to increasing electric vehicle capacity, the executive said Ford has a vision of converting more than 80 percent of reservation holders of its upcoming F-150 Lightning EV into owners. Accordingly, the company details that more than 160,000 deposits have been made requiring a fully refundable $100 transaction for the car prior to its arrival at dealerships in mid-2022.

While it is true that estimates indicate that Ford would be in second place among electric car manufacturers, it is necessary to take into account the proposal of General Motors, which has among its main plans the sale of one million models worldwide by 2025.

Written by I Jhonattan González

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That is why the U.S. company announced a multi-million dollar budget for the manufacture of electric vehicles, as well as the construction of highly innovative battery plants and a complex for electrified trucks.

Overall, Ford and SK Innovation, a South Korean supplier, will invest 11.4 billion dollars in the project. The North Americans have reported that they will approve a $30 billion fund for the electrification of their product range up to 2025.

Impressive Facilities

The manufacturer and the Asian company will build two new facilities, “Blue Oval City” in Tennessee and “BlueOvalSK Battery Park” in Kentucky. The first will produce electric vehicles and batteries, while the second will be exclusively for battery manufacturing.

Bill Ford, great-great-grandson of the company’s founder pointed out that just as Ford led the Industrial Revolution, they will now lead the transformation to combat the climate crisis. “This is the moment when our leadership is important. The world is changing in profound ways,” he said.

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For his part, Ford CEO Jim Farley stressed that BlueOval will mark “the beginning of a new golden age” of the automobile.

Blue Oval City, will be six square miles in size, much larger than the Ford Rouge plant that Henry Ford built in the Detroit area a century ago. The Tennessee campus is expected to employ 6,000 people, house suppliers and a battery recycling operation.

The organization also issued a statement explaining that the facility will be one of the largest auto production centers in U.S. history and will operate as a vertically integrated system to reduce costs and minimize environmental impact.

Ford’s announcement is one of the largest investments by an automaker to move rapidly to electric vehicles and phase out gasoline-powered cars and trucks, as part of a global effort to combat climate change. Transportation is responsible for about 30% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, more than the energy sector.

Written by I Jhonattan González

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The U.S. automaker announced a partnership with Redwood Materials to promote the reuse of batteries and a national supply chain of this element for electric vehicles.

The partnership is a clear indication that the automaker is taking conscious steps to address the supply and cost of the various raw materials needed to produce the electrified cars.

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The program will recycle scrap materials from Ford at their facility in Carson City, Nevada. However, over time, as the company increases plant strength, Redwood Materials will build new recycling centers closer to the battery manufacturing complexes.

Import Reduction 

Through a release, Ford emphasizes that Redwood Materials will help them minimize reliance on importing many of the materials used when producing batteries, and subsequently reduce the extraction of raw materials, which will be very important in the future. 

“The creation of this domestic supply chain is really an important step towards making electric vehicles more accessible to everyone,” adds Ford.

Lisa Drake, Chief Operating Officer of Ford in North America, stressed the importance of recycling batteries, noting that the industry could be overwhelmed by demand.

“This approach will help ensure that valuable materials re-enter the supply chain at the end of their useful life and do not end up in landfills,” she said.

Redwood Materials’ Focus

The Redwood recycling technology can recover, on average, more than 95% of elements, such as nickel, cobalt, lithium and copper. These materials can then be reused within a closed loop in which the company goes on to manufacture copper foil for anode and active materials for cathode, contributing to the future production of entirely new batteries. 

Founded in 2017 by former Tesla Inc Executive JB Straubel, it has been recycling batteries and leftover materials. By mid-September, the organization said it would expand its business to include refining components to equip one million electric vehicles after 2025.

Back in July, Redwood raised $700 million from investors, including Amazon Inc, Fidelity, T. Rowe Price and Baillie Gifford.

Written by I Jhonattan González

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The company sees the prototype as one of the most innovative products introduced so far on the sustainable market, as the famous pickup evolves to adapt to industry trends. 

The investment totals $250 million and creates 450 additional direct jobs at the Rouge Electric Vehicle Center, the Van Dyke Electric Train Center and the Rawsonville Component Plant. The project is expected to help increase production capacity to 80,000 trucks per year.

Related content: Volkswagen will have a new laboratory for battery development

It features an emission-free propulsion system with a maximum power output of 563 hp, 10.50 Nm of torque and a 300-mile range.

At the opening of the Electric Vehicle Center, Ford hosted U.S. government officials, including Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and Congresswoman Debbie Dingell, to celebrate the commitment of the company with the state, celebrating the pre-production start of the Ford F-150 Lightning. 

“We are on the brink of an electrification era that will be built in factories like this one by Ford workers and innovative minds,” Governor Whitmer stated.

“I am proud that Ford has committed to investing millions of dollars in electrification through 2025, and creating 450 jobs to support the production of the new vehicle.

Overall Success

According to Ford reports, orders for up to 150,000 units have been booked to date, indicating both public interest and the commercial success ahead. The 100,000-unit limit was reached in just three weeks. 

Despite being an electric vehicle, the F-150 maintains intact the essence of both its visual appearance and styling, in line with electrification. 

Kumar Galhotra, President of the Americas and International Markets Group at Ford, said the pickup is intended to be more than just a zero-emission truck, but is packed with ingenious features and technology that will improve over time.

Written by I Jhonattan González

The post F-150 Lightning: The Electric Pick-up that Ford will Launch Soon appeared first on Green Racing News.

When Ford decided to build its first electric vehicle in a “Mustang,” it took the risk of upsetting fans of the brand who did not like that a Mustang wasn’t fuel-efficient.

However, the decision to electrify their cars remained firm in Ford.

“Ford has built 27,816 electric Mustang Mach-E models at a plant in Mexico this year compared to 26,089 copies of the traditional Mustang internal combustion engine at a Michigan factory, according to production data released by the automaker. Thursday, “says the brand.

In that sense, Ford was able to rapidly increase production of its first all-electric vehicle built to be electric from the ground up.

While technically an important milestone, the production of EVs over gasoline may not continue to be the case for the firm due to a shortage of chips.

“We are really excited about the success we are having with the launch of the new Mustang Mach-E, not only here in the United States, but also globally. In fairness, keep in mind that Mustang and Flat Rock have been affected by external factors, which has been the shortage of semiconductor chips, “said Erich Merkle, Ford sales analyst.

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Likewise, Ford CEO Jim Farley confirmed that the automaker switched supply to new vehicle launches:

“We have intentionally protected our launches: Bronco, Bronco Sport, Mach-E, F-150. If we can change a module to one of those launch vehicles, we have it. We protect launches a lot because they are very important to our business. “

Notably, the Mustang Mach-E is also having some success in international markets by becoming the best-selling car in Norway last month. Although to be fair, it benefited from a buildup in demand in the country.

In the United States, Ford sold 1,945 Mach-E vehicles last month, which is still less than the 4,436 Mustangs delivered during the same period.

Written by | Osward Rubio

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It is important to remember that a few years ago Ford did not see much value in going into battery cell production however, things have changed. Now the automaker is completely focused on the electrical transition, and understands that in case of producing electric vehicles in large quantities, it must insure battery cells.

Since Tesla’s partnership with Panasonic, several construction companies have partnered with battery manufacturers to further secure supply. For example, General Motors has collaborated with LG Energy Solutions for the Ultium battery platform.

“Ford and SK Innovation announced today they have signed an MoU to create a joint venture – to be called BlueOvalSK – to produce approximately 60 GWh annually in traction battery cells and array modules, starting mid-decade, with potential to expand,” says the American company.

The announcement comes just after the Ford F-150 Lightning was unveiled and a few weeks after the automaker reported a new investment in battery research and development and a team called “Ford Ion Park.”

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Ford predicts that it will need around 240 GWh of battery cell annually by 2030, and this new partnership will help them achieve that.

“This MoU is just the start; it’s a key part of our plan to vertically integrate key capabilities that will differentiate Ford far into the future. We will not cede our future to anyone else,” explains Jim Farley, Ford president and CEO,

The new association will start producing cells from “the middle of the decade” and Ford is talking about “next generation cells” but not yet going into details.

Furthermore, the press release on the new joint venture mentions Ford’s investment in Solid Power, a solid-state battery startup that aims to bring its next-generation solid-state batteries into production by mid-mid-2000.

Written by | Gabriel Sayago

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The American company earlier this week introduced the F-150 Lightning, an all-electric version of the company’s best-selling pickup truck.

The vehicle has the potential to greatly accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles in the United States given that the F-150 is already the best-selling passenger vehicle on the market.

Ford CEO Jim Farley said that on the first day alone the construction giant received 20,000 orders on the first day, and now confirmed that the number rose to 44,000 reservations for the F-150 Lightning in 48 hours.

The automaker’s strategy is to accept reservations with a $ 100 refundable deposit for the electric truck due out in mid-2022.

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The small deposit results in a moderate show of interest, but the terms are the same for the Tesla Cybertruck, giving us an interesting point of comparison.

When Tesla introduced the Cybertruck in 2019, the California-based company announced that it received more than 146,000 bookings on the first day.

Tesla reached about 250,000 reservations for the Cybertruck in the first week, and it is now believed that it received more than 650,000 reservations for the electric truck.

With the current reception, the electric truck space is starting to become very competitive.

Rivian said it will begin deliveries of the R1T, its electric pickup, next month. Then the Hummer EV pickup later this year, then the Tesla Cybertruck and the Ford F-150 next year.

With more than 3 million pickup trucks sold in the United States each year, the market will progressively electrify to a good level.

Written by | Gabriel Sayago

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Solid Power, is a Colorado-based startup (newly created company that markets products or services through the use of new technologies with a scalable business model) that emerged from a battery research program at the University of Colorado Boulder. BMW invested in the startup in 2017 and Ford followed up with its own investment in the company in 2019.

Along with the investment, BMW and Ford “expanded existing joint development agreements with Solid Power to secure all solid-state batteries for future electric vehicles.”

Solid state batteries are widely regarded as the next generation of battery cells to power the sale of electric vehicles. They offer advantages such as the potential for higher energy density (longer range), faster charging, and may be more secure.

However, there have been problems bringing them to volume production at a cost where they can compete with the latest lithium-ion battery cells that have brought the cost down significantly over the last decade.

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Faced with the problem, several companies claim to be solving those problems and are now ready to invest in mass production of these solid-state cells. In this sense, car manufacturers have shown interest in seeking to ensure the supply of battery cells to support their plans for electric vehicles.

“The investment positions Solid Power to produce full-scale automotive batteries, increase associated material output and expand in-house production capabilities for future vehicle integration. The BMW Group and Ford aim to utilize Solid Power’s low-cost, high-energy all solid-state battery technology in forthcoming electric vehicles,” Solid Power says in a press release.

The company said both Ford and BMW should use batteries from that pilot production line next year to test in their own electric vehicles.

If all goes well, it will be a few more years before they can go into mass production and put the batteries in production electric vehicles.

Written by | Gabriel Sayago

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