Last year, to meet growing demand for its products, Ford launched 23 vehicles to customers around the world, opened three manufacturing facilities and added more than 5,000 new jobs in the US.
These expansions all came about as a result of the company’s business plan for global success – its One Ford strategy. From Europe to North America under One Ford, the company’s vehicles share the same design, yet are tailored to the regional needs of customers. With common platform architectures as the foundation, engineers then adjust the individual vehicle designs to meet customer needs in each region.
Barb Samardzich is the vice-president and chief operating officer of Ford of Europe and has held that position since 1 November 2013, when the company announced changes in its senior leadership team.
With a strong engineering background, Samardzich is responsible for many of Ford of Europe’s operations, including manufacturing, quality, product development, purchasing, sustainability, environment and safety engineering.
PE spoke to Samardzich at the 2015 Frankfurt Motor Show about how the manufacturer plans to build on the One Ford strategy to continue to achieve profitable growth across geographies and product types, as well as to make sure that its products meet customer demands.
One Ford has been a key factor in your business success in previous years. Do you see it as an ongoing strategy?
The first thing that comes into my mind about One Ford is that it is a way of life. It’s the way we design our products and do business, and is so ingrained now in the fabric of how we do our work.
We divide up the product based on what makes the most sense for the engineers. They may happen to work in the UK, Brazil or Australia. We divide up the product based on the workload levelling. It’s all about delivering a global product to any of the regions around the world.
How have you adapted the strategy in Europe specifically, and how do you cater for different markets?
The strategy involves us taking a product that is designed globally and tailoring it for particular market needs, whether that’s here in Europe or another region.
The best example I can point to is the Ford Edge SUV, that has been a recent focus of ours. The Edge is developed under a One Ford umbrella, as it is produced in our plant in Canada but is being brought into Europe.
We knew this was a product that would work for us in Europe, but that we wouldn’t have the volume to warrant an assembly plant here, so we take it via One Ford from Canada and tailor it specifically for the European market.
Two big tailoring actions that were needed were to provide the car with a diesel engine and modify it to be a right-hand drive. These actions made sure that the product would fit into the European market, and that it was a product a European customer would want.
As well as keeping to regional regulations, how do you make sure the product meets consumer requirements in different markets?
A great example of this is our Focus RS hatchback. We are developing it here in Europe, but will be able to ship it out into all the other regions that are interested in having it. This is because we have carried out all the emissions and safety work and solved any differences between North America and Europe, so we can bring it into that market.
To ensure we fully understand the needs of the user in a particular market, we have a representative who sits with the programme team that is developing that product. They represent the voice of the customer from that particular region. The expert will work with the design team to make sure that consumer input is there, so their needs are met.
With this in mind, do you still see a place for regionally targeted products?
One Ford doesn’t mean that everything has to go global. It also means that we
fill the needs for regional products
where appropriate.
The F-150 truck, for example, caters for the North American market. It is a regionally targeted product but still valid under One Ford.
Another example is the Transit Courier van. While we would love for other regions to say that product would work great there, it’s very much European and regionally focused.
Much of your focus recently has been on growth in particular vehicle segments, such as an SUV offensive in Europe. Why is this an important factor for future growth?
If you look at the segmentation data, consumers are clearly leaning towards the SUV and crossover utility vehicle segments. That’s why we are focusing on five SUVs that we are going to launch in Europe over the next five years. They are either new or completely refreshed.
We think it is important to have a full complement of products in these arenas, because that’s where we see customers heading.
Once we have all those products in Europe, we think we’ve got a great line-up to support the shift that we see in consumers now, which is a shift into the SUV market. The EcoSport is an affordable entry-level vehicle, the Kuga addresses the mainstream segment, and then we have our premium offering with the Edge.
You also recently released the premium Mondeo Vignale car in Europe. What customer do you see this appealing to and why have you targeted this model at the European market?
Our expectations of how our customers will respond to the Vignale are high. We have just recently launched it and are finally getting the product into the dealerships and giving our customers the Vignale experience.
We noticed that customers in our showrooms were looking for something more than what we were offering in terms of features, specifications and amenities. They were looking for a higher level, a more premium offering.
In cars such as the S-Max or Galaxy, the most popular model is Titanium – our highest specification. This was a sign to us that we needed to do something more via the product offering as well as the dealership experience.
What we decided to do was to create a premium offering for our customers, as well as customers who may have come into our Ford showroom. That offering has the potential to attract them and secure them as future Ford customers.
Ford offers a vast range of powertrain types, and has not committed itself to a specific powertrain technology. How do the powertrain types offered by the company differ regionally?
It is important for us to offer a variety of powertrains to our customers, and a lot of them are regionally dependent.
For example, the diesel market in Europe varies significantly from the diesel market in other regions. There is virtually no diesel market in North America, so offering a different powertrain to those customers is vital for success in those markets.
On the petrol side of the business, we have our EcoBoost engines. This is a technology that supports customer desires for performance feel and fun to drive, as well as having increased fuel economy.
How do you ensure that the products you are offering in multiple markets are suitable in terms of emissions regulations?
We keep the regulatory requirements right in front of us, because we know our job is to make sure we have the technologies that will enable us to meet them.
In terms of how it affects our development, we try to do that in the most cost-effective way for our customers’ benefit, at the same time making sure that we meet every regulation that comes down the line, whether it’s fuel economy, emissions or safety.
That’s the fun of being an engineer in the automotive industry – rising to challenges to find the most affordable technology to meet these requirements.