Andrew Stuttaford wrote a great piece about Volkswagen’s woes. As he notes, when it comes to automakers, there is plenty of bad news to go around:
The flow of bad news from automakers (in the U.S., as well as Europe) keeps on coming, but it is the European manufacturers who are in the most trouble for now, torn between what the regulators are demanding (more EVs), what consumers are buying (far fewer EVs than expected), and what Chinese carmakers are selling (EVs at a price low enough for buyers to overlook their flaws).
As I was reading his piece, more evidence of the weak demand for EVs popped onto my screen. This time about the electric truck Ford F-150 Lightning. The Wall Street Journal reports:
Ford Motor F -1.48%decrease; red down pointing triangle is pausing production of its electric F-150 Lightning truck for several weeks, as the outlook for electric vehicles remains downbeat, with car companies confronting slumping demand.
The Dearborn, Mich., automaker said Thursday that it would idle the assembly factory that makes the battery-powered truck from mid-November to Jan. 6. The Lightning, a centerpiece of the legacy auto manufacturer’s EV strategy, has been the victim of steep price cuts and waning interest from consumers.
The pause comes less than a year after Ford announced it was permanently cutting a production shift at the plant in suburban Detroit, where it builds the electric truck. …
Ford in August said it was scrapping plans for an electric three-row sport-utility vehicle, citing pressure on prices for battery-powered cars.
Automakers have poured billions of dollars into developing and churning out more electric vehicles, even as their new models continue to generate steep losses.
In July, the WSJ had reported a number for Ford’s EV losses: “about $1.3 billion in the quarter ended in March, excluding taxes and interest expenses.”