{"id":872546,"date":"2021-05-24T14:35:41","date_gmt":"2021-05-24T18:35:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/?p=239306"},"modified":"2021-05-24T14:35:41","modified_gmt":"2021-05-24T18:35:41","slug":"ford-ceo-jim-farley-on-the-f-150-lightning-the-ev-revolution","status":"publish","type":"station","link":"https:\/\/platoaistream.net\/plato-data\/ford-ceo-jim-farley-on-the-f-150-lightning-the-ev-revolution\/","title":{"rendered":"Ford CEO Jim Farley On The F-150 Lightning & The EV Revolution"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Ford says its F-150 Lightning will disrupt the automobile business in the same way the Model T did back in 1908. Is that an idle boast? To find out, The Verge<\/a><\/em> sent Nilay Patel to interview Jim Farley, CEO of Ford Motor Company. The result is a more than 10,000-word essay that everyone who wants to know more about the EV revolution in America should read. What follows is a condensed version of that story.<\/p>\n

A Transformative Event<\/h3>\n
\"Ford<\/a><\/p>\n

Ford F-150 Lightning, image courtesy of Ford.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

First, let\u2019s give credit where credit is due. Elon Musk and Tesla started the whole \u201cautomobile as computer\u201d idea more than a decade ago. What was considered radical then is becoming mainstream today. The massive 15.5\u2033 touchscreen in the Lightning is proof of that. Over the air updates were novel in 2012. Today they are an essential part of any vehicle that wants to compete with the best the world has to offer. The Lightning is no exception. The thing no one at Ford expected is the massive amount of data that flows back to the manufacturer from connected cars.<\/p>\n

Farley says,<\/p>\n

\u201cThe second thing we\u2019ve learned [after the importance of charging], the data off the vehicle is just invaluable. We are constantly shocked every day of how many quality issues we can catch and improve in an over the air update. We did our first high volume OTA for the F-150 and the Mach-E, and we solved a bunch of problems, like battery drains, that in the past would have taken a safety recall. So we\u2019re really saving money, more than we thought, in improving quality. But it takes a lot to do that all, because the datasets off the vehicles every moment are so big. There\u2019s such big datasets. And you need AI to analyze what\u2019s a problem, and what\u2019s just a signal.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe third thing I would say is we\u2019re now realizing how important it is to have a dedicated group \u2014 far after job one \u2014 to make that customer OTA feature set better and better and better. So we get 10 more miles every year out of the range, we get four or five marquee customer experiences like BlueCruise that we OTA. For a car company [that was] focused on, \u201cwe\u2019ll sell you a car and we\u2019ll see you in four years,\u201d [that requires] being always on for the customer every day. It is a complete game-changer where we have to be software-first.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

A Watershed Moment<\/h3>\n

\u201cYou know, look, it\u2019s a watershed moment,\u201d Farley says. \u201cI\u2019ve been involved in the industry, worked for multiple brands, and I have never, ever driven a vehicle like this. We\u2019ve been really hard at work innovating [the] 1.1 million F-series we make every year. We have a lot of scale, we can pass a lot of that benefit on to the customer, but we want to move customers to electric. We want this to be affordable and also give people a surprising product that they didn\u2019t expect.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re such a dominant commercial brand. People don\u2019t know this about Ford, but we\u2019re 40 percent of the commercial light duty vehicles in the US. We\u2019re the leading brand in Europe, we are one of the leaders in China. We\u2019re definitely a leader in the countries that I mentioned, with Ranger. Ford is the number one producer of automobiles in the US. We have more people making cars and vehicles than anyone else, even though we\u2019re not the largest [automaker].<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI drove the latest prototype last week with Bill Ford, and I have to tell you \u2014 I\u2019ve been involved, I\u2019ve been a big sponsor of this project, [and] I was totally blown away. It\u2019s faster than a Raptor, 770 foot-pounds of torque, zero to 60 in 4 seconds. The batteries are low, the center of gravity is low, it\u2019s got a new independent rear suspension and standard four-wheel drive.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cSo the whole driving experience is totally different than a full-size pickup truck. It\u2019s fast, it\u2019s planted, it\u2019s quiet. It\u2019s like, what is going on with this thing? And then you have the whole frunk, four days of power for your home, it\u2019s a digital product as well. I think people are going to be surprised that the innovation is far beyond the batteries and the motors.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

F-150 Lightning Versus Cybertruck<\/h3>\n
https:\/\/media.ford.com\/content\/fordmedia\/fna\/us\/en.relatedmedia.viewmore.image.html\/<\/p>\n

” data-medium-file=”https:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/files\/2021\/05\/Ford-Lightning-towing-400×225.jpeg” data-large-file=”https:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/files\/2021\/05\/Ford-Lightning-towing-800×450.jpeg” loading=”lazy” class=”wp-image-239094 size-full” title=”Ford F-150 Lightning” src=”https:\/\/platoaistream.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/ford-ceo-jim-farley-on-the-f-150-lightning-the-ev-revolution.jpg” alt=”Ford F-150 Lightning” width=”880″ height=”495″ srcset=”https:\/\/platoaistream.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/ford-ceo-jim-farley-on-the-f-150-lightning-the-ev-revolution.jpg 880w, https:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/files\/2021\/05\/Ford-Lightning-towing-400×225.jpeg 400w, https:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/files\/2021\/05\/Ford-Lightning-towing-800×450.jpeg 800w, https:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/files\/2021\/05\/Ford-Lightning-towing-768×432.jpeg 768w, https:\/\/cleantechnica.com\/files\/2021\/05\/Ford-Lightning-towing-600×337.jpeg 600w” sizes=”(max-width: 880px) 100vw, 880px”><\/a><\/p>\n

Image courtesy of Ford<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The F-150 Lightning is thoroughly conventional apart from being all electric. \u201cAre you anticipating that with the Lightning you\u2019re going to get mostly new truck owners or are you going to convert the huge base of existing truck owners?,\u201d Patel asked. \u201cI think it\u2019s going to be a mixture of both,\u201d Farley says.<\/p>\n

Is he concerned about competition from the Cybertruck? Give a listen.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe did a survey recently and asked customers who were intending to buy a pickup truck: if you were going to buy an electric pickup truck, who would you buy it from? Who would you expect to do a good job to come to the market? Ford was by far the most preferred brand. Unlike sedans, where Tesla was a preferred brand. We were way above Tesla [in trucks], because of our history, and we know this customer.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI think what\u2019s really different at Ford, what we\u2019re bringing to the charging network is [that] we\u2019re focused on commercial customers with this Lightning. We\u2019re going to have a retail one and we\u2019re going to have a Lightning that\u2019s focused on commercial customers. It will be white, it\u2019ll be very basic specs, and it\u2019s going to be for work customers.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWork customers are totally different than electric retail. They don\u2019t overbuy on the battery, [and] they have repeatable duty cycles. So they basically drive the same route every day, they know exactly how many miles it is, and they do depot charging. They don\u2019t do charging on the road. If you\u2019re a plumber, or electrician, you\u2019ve got five vehicles, you charge at your business, and what we\u2019re going to bring is a charging solution that\u2019s very unique for the commercial customer.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cNow on the retail side, we put [in] a ton of technology to make the charging of these very large batteries very unique for this truck, for the retail customer. And so I will be very interested to see how we compete with others on the charging experience, because we put a lot of extra content to allow for DC fast charging, to go faster on this than what we think the competition is going to do.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cIn addition, we have bi-directional charging, which is also totally new. We\u2019ll be able to send electrons back to your house. You can sell them to the grid, and we have a special solution for retail customers who want to do that, and we put it standard in the truck. So that\u2019s going to be a bit of a difference than Mach-E, because the charging hardware on the F-150 is different than the Mach-E.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Farley proudly points out that Tesla is hoping to sell a few hundred thousand Cybertrucks. Ford sells nearly a million F-Series trucks a year and has been doing so for decades. Does it know truck customers and what they want? Oh, yeah. \u201cOn pickup trucks, all I\u2019ll say is there are lots of flavors of soda, but there\u2019s only one Coke, and there\u2019ll be lots of electric pickup trucks; [but] there\u2019s only one F-150.<\/p>\n

The Takeaway<\/h3>\n

I started writing for Gas2<\/em> \u2014 a small part of the CleanTechinca<\/em> global empire \u2014 more than a decade ago. 5 years later, I was promoted to the varsity team. All told, I have written thousands of articles, many of then focused on the emerging world of electric cars. There was a huge surge of interest when the Tesla Model 3 was first announced. People around the world stood out in the rain and cold for hours to be the first to order one. It was the most talked about event in the world of automobiles since Jaguar first introduced the XK-E.<\/p>\n

The buzz surrounding the F-150 Lightning<\/a> is every bit as supercharged as the Model 3 news. The Mustang Mach-E is cool, but an all electric F-150? That could well be the best thing to happen at Ford since the Tin Lizzie. There\u2019s excitement in the air and it is contagious. It feels like the EV revolution \u2014 at least in America \u2014 just shifted into a higher gear and is gaining speed.<\/p>\n

Jim Farley and his minions have stolen the spotlight, at least for now. The new Hummer<\/a> is a sideshow. The Lightning represents a sea change in how Ford views the future and that change will have ramifications throughout American society.<\/p>\n

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