Ford’s secret EV unit endures despite market slowdown, exec departure
LONG BEACH, Calif. — As the global auto industry retreats from all-electric vehicles after reporting billions of dollars in losses Ford Motor It continues to push forward with next-generation EVs, which CEO Jim Farley describes as industry-defining products.
Ford’s move comes despite a major slowdown in EV adoption, a $19.5 billion electric vehicle restructuring charge for the company, the removal of U.S. consumer incentives for purchasing electric vehicles, and the sudden departure of the company’s leading EV executive.
“Agility is key,” Alan Clarke, Ford’s EV product leader, told CNBC during an interview at the company’s new Electric Vehicle Development Center in Long Beach, California. “We’ve been able to pivot around all the different market conditions. … There’s been huge headwinds in the EV industry, and so we’ve had to adapt to that.”
A Ford employee works in the high voltage laboratory at Ford’s new Electric Vehicle Development Center in Long Beach, California.
Courtesy of Ford
Ford’s continued confidence comes from the “Universal Electric Vehicle,” or UEV, platform the company has developed from a clean design, albeit at lower and slower capital rates than it previously anticipated. Ford’s goal for UEV is to be profitable and cost competitive with global EV leaders in China. Tesla’s.
The UEV is expected to be critical to Ford transforming its Model e EV unit from a billion-dollar annual loss to breakeven by 2029. The company said its future EVs will be profitable within a year of launch.
The first planned product based on the UEV will be a mid-size pickup truck for the U.S. market next year for around $30,000, followed by a family of vehicles powered by the platform.
“The midsize pickup truck is not going to have anything to compete with it in price or product form, and so I think it stands alone in that sense,” said Clarke.
Clad in black, red and white Nike Air Jordan 1s and a blue button-up shirt under a black jacket, Clarke was employee No. 1 on the formerly secretive “skunk works” team that led the development of Ford’s UEV.
The 12½-year Tesla veteran was recently promoted from senior director to vice president of Advanced Development Projects. This comes after Ford announced the unexpected departure of its highly acclaimed head of EV and technology, Doug Field, last month.
Clarke, who was hired by Field, continues to speak highly of him. Farley also continued to praise Tesla and Apple veteran since announcing his departure on April 15.
“Like Jim, he set us up for success,” Clarke said. “It’s certainly not that nothing is changing. I think we’re in the phase we’re in now, which is what’s best for Ford, and I think Doug definitely recognized that and it was the right time for him as well.”
chinese competition
Alan Clarke, Ford’s general manager of advanced EV development, during a video presentation on Ford’s Universal Electric Vehicle platform.
Courtesy of Ford
Despite Field’s departure and the future of domestic electric vehicles being less promising, Ford’s UEV efforts continue.
The growth of Chinese companies (though they have yet to enter the US market) has been a rallying cry for Ford’s UEV efforts. Farley has He praised Chinese automakers for their creativity and products, and also called for protection from them in the US
“Because of the importance of the auto industry and our industrial base, we are really fully committed to ensuring a level playing field in the United States and at the same time protecting our domestic market,” Farley said last week.
Outside the U.S., Ford and other automakers are trying to maintain market share in Europe, South America and other countries after losing it to domestic companies in China.
Chinese brands’ global market share has increased nearly 70% in five years, according to GlobalData, and many experts see a threat to U.S. automakers, including the expected entry of Chinese brands into America.
Clarke said he was “pretty confident” the UEV platform could be competitive against Chinese vehicles. But he added that companies operate by “different rules,” citing government support Chinese companies receive as well as low labor costs, among other things.
“We only win quickly and we have to play by the rules here,” said Clarke. “We’re pretty confident we’re going to be competitive, and we’re really hungry to look competitive, and ultimately we’re not going to win unless we get down to the prices that American consumers are willing to pay for these types of electric vehicles.”
But while Ford has thoroughly inspected and broken down Chinese vehicles, it’s a moving target. There are hundreds of Chinese automakers launching new products at unprecedented rates.
Automotive consulting firm AlixPartners reported that Chinese startups started developing vehicles in about 20 months. The company stated that this period is half that of traditional global automakers, which results in Chinese models being two to three years newer than brands outside China.
“It’s not really one thing, but a series of things that get them to a very repeatable vehicle launch cycle in less than two years,” said Mark Wakefield, global automotive leader and managing partner at AlixPartners, adding that Chinese companies spend a third less time on product validation. “This is a big challenge for all auto companies.”
That’s one reason why the UEV’s first product is destined for North America, as Ford looks to partner with other automakers such as France-based Renault and Germany-based Renault. volkswagen and reportedly some Chinese companies to better compete globally.
“Our focus right now on UEV is to make a vehicle that can be sold anywhere, but our focus right now is really on the North American market,” said Clarke.
Ford Universal Electric Vehicle
Ford CEO Jim Farley speaks at the Louisville Assembly Plant as he shares the company’s plans to design and assemble groundbreaking electric vehicles in the U.S., Aug. 11, 2025.
Courtesy: Ford
Ford has very high expectations for the UEV, which Clarke and others have called a “moonshot.”
Ford expects the new EVs to have costs comparable to gas-powered vehicles thanks to new technologies and efficiencies. These are alongside a smaller battery pack consisting of new lithium iron phosphate cells produced by the US A 48-volt electrical architecture that increases efficiency and reduces weight.
Currently, the massive batteries powering EVs have made them much more expensive and unprofitable to produce. Ford expects its Model eEV unit to lose $4 billion to $4.5 billion this year, down from a loss of $4.8 billion last year.
The Detroit automaker said the new EVs will reduce parts by 20% compared to the Ford Mustang Mach-E EV, with 25% fewer fasteners, 40% fewer workstation docking times and 15% faster assembly time.
Farley likened the importance of the UEV to Ford’s historic Model T, which “put the world on wheels” and described the US-made project as a $5 billion “bet” on America to produce it.
“This represents the most radical change in how we design and build vehicles at Ford since the Model T,” Farley said last year in a speech at Ford’s Louisville Assembly Plant in Kentucky, which will produce electric midsize pickups.
A Ford employee works in the automaker’s manufacturing shop at Ford’s new Electric Vehicle Development Center in Long Beach, California.
Courtesy of Ford
But this isn’t the first time, or even the second time, that Farley’s expectations for the company’s EVs have fallen short.
Farley had previously described the automaker’s all-electric F-150 Lightning as a “T model moment” for the company, but it failed to live up to expectations and is being redesigned as a hybrid.
He also said Ford’s planned three-row EV SUV would be a “personal bullet train,” a year before the company canceled the project in 2024 after deciding it wouldn’t be profitable in the foreseeable future.
Ford executives think they’ve learned from those mistakes by focusing on smaller, more affordable vehicles using the UEV platform rather than large pickups and SUVs, where batteries cost more than the soon-promised electric pickup.
Ford said the new pickup will have just two structural front and rear parts, compared to 146 such components in its current gas-powered Maverick small pickup.
To do this, the company uses megacasting, pouring materials such as molten aluminum into large molds to create parts; This means the automaker has fewer, larger parts to use in assembling its vehicles.
“We like to say that the best part is no part at all, and the next best part is the part that serves more than one purpose,” Mitch Shinn, a thermal systems engineer on Ford’s advanced EV team, said during a media event at the facility.
Ford employees in the thermal testing room at Ford’s new Electric Vehicle Development Center in Long Beach, California.
Courtesy of Ford
Farley recently said the advanced EV team isn’t just about products; The division and new facility are helping Ford rethink how it designs, develops and manufactures new products across its vehicle portfolio.
The Skunk Works team was first founded in California around 2022. It was intended to be a small, agile team that could work freely without the bureaucracy and tedious processes of a multibillion-dollar company like Ford.
“We also bow skunk “A model is working to improve the whole of Ford,” Farley said last week. “They’ve done an incredible job creating the UEV platform, which represents a step change in efficiency and cost, especially for the EV market. But at Ford we’re now integrating these skunk “We are taking steps to return to our core products and processes.”
New EV development center
Ford Motor’s new Electric Vehicle Development Center in Long Beach, California.
Courtesy of Ford
A tour of Ford’s new Electric Vehicle Development Center gives an insight into why the automaker isn’t pulling the plug on its all-electric vehicle ambitions or its poor work team.
While the buildings continue to be constructed, approximately 350 employees from a variety of professional backgrounds, including Tesla, aerospace, defense and Ford, work in laboratories, design studios and office spaces.
The complex consists of two 270,000-square-foot buildings and is located in a still-growing industrial park across from the Long Beach airport. Ford is also building a 150,000-square-foot testing and validation facility at the site.
Clarke told CNBC that the new facility was built for future EVs, not for development of the pickup, which was done as part of the undercover skunk studies team.
He declined to disclose plans for future electric vehicles but said the facility also provides the potential to work on next-generation products for the UEV platform, as well as other vehicles.
The interior of Ford Motor’s new Electric Vehicle Development Center in Long Beach, California.
Courtesy of Ford
This kind of thinking and mindset is often associated with consumer electronics rather than the automotive industry, but that may be the point.
“We can meet our extraction target next year,” said Clarke. “What you’re seeing here is generally a big investment in future products. We want to go faster than we can.”
