Ford Motor Co F CEO Jim Farley said on Thursday the company's hotly-anticipated electric pickup truck F-150 Lightning has enough demand to match that of Tesla Inc’s TSLA mid-size electric sports utility vehicle Model Y.
What Happened: Farley said that, based on the current demand, the legacy automaker could easily rival the Tesla vehicle if it had a full production available.
“...if we had full production today to meet our current demand we would rival the Model Y as the leading BEV nameplate in the U.S. market,” Farley told investors in a post earnings call.
Farley did not provide an individual breakup but said Ford has secured 275,000 reservations for the all-electric Mustang Mach-E SUVs, F-150 Lightning pickups and E-Transit commercial vehicles.
The Dearborn, Michigan-based company's CEO said the automaker plans to take full advantage of the “first-mover position” in the fully electric pickup truck market, starting with Lightning.
“We are well on our way to achieve at least a 40% mix of battery-electric vehicles by 2030 with strong margins and equal to our higher market share in the key high-profit high-volume segments we compete in.”
Ford had in January said it plans to ramp up Lightning production to about 80,000 units for the 2023 model year and then to a run-rate of 150,000 units per year by mid-2023.
Deliveries for the F-150 Lightning are scheduled to begin this spring. The full-size electric pickup is priced at $39,974 for the base model with a range of 230 miles for the standard range.
The automaker had last month said it will double electric vehicle production to 600,000 units by 2023 to meet high demand.
Q4 Earnings: Ford reported adjusted earnings of 26 cents for the fourth quarter, significantly lower than the analyst of 45 cents a share. Automotive revenue was $35.3 billion during the quarter, below the estimate of $35.5 billion.
Ford said it expects global vehicle deliveries to increase by a range of 10% to 15% this year. It forecast pretax profit to rise 15% to 25% to a range of $11.5 billion to $12.5 billion in 2022.
The automaker said it expects to hit 8% pretax profit margin in 2022, a year ahead of schedule.
Why It Matters: Tesla sold nearly a million electric vehicles globally in 2021. The Elon Musk-led company delivered and produced a total of 911,208 and 906,032 Model 3 and Model Y vehicles, respectively.
Tesla does not break down individual delivery or production volumes; the Model 3 is the most affordable electric vehicle in its lineup.
Price Action: Ford shares closed 3.6% lower at $19.9 a share on Thursday and were down 4.2% after hours.
Photo: Courtesy of Ford
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