Ford’s Model e Electric Vehicle Segment Struggles with Price Wars: Loss of 1.3 Billion USD in First Quarter

Ford’s Model e electric vehicle segment faced a loss of 1.3 billion USD in the first quarter, with each car sold translating to 132,000 USD. Despite selling 10,000 electric vehicles in the first quarter, a 20% decrease from the previous year, Ford reported a revenue decrease of 84% to just 100 million USD due to a price war in the industry.

John Lawler, Ford’s Chief Financial Officer, stated that the price war among electric vehicle manufacturers has been ongoing for nearly two years and is making it challenging to achieve profits. Although they reduced costs by $5,000 per Mustang Mach-E, sales continued to decline rapidly. Jim Farley, Ford CEO, announced that the company is making changes in their electric vehicle segment to potentially achieve profitability with the next generation of cars.

Ford is not alone in this transition from gasoline cars to electric cars; they are one of many traditional car manufacturers making this shift. However, unlike other companies that do not disclose specific results for their electric vehicle segments, Ford does so explicitly. Last year’s Model e segment resulted in a loss of 4.7 billion USD and 116,000 units sold.

Ford Pro handles high-volume sales to business and government customers and has substantial demand for electric vehicles like the E-Transit and F-150 Lightning. Recent orders show promise for these vehicles’ success. On the other hand, Ford Blue sells gasoline cars to consumers and experienced a decline in revenue and units sold but generated a profit of 905 million USD in the first quarter of the year.

Despite varying success across industries like Tesla reporting decreased profits and revenue in Q1 while General Motors and Stellantis reported positive business results in their respective electric vehicle segments