Ford announced on Thursday that it delaying a $12 billion investment in electric vehicle (EV) manufacturing facilities, including halting the construction of a second battery plant in Kentucky, per CNBC.
Ford said in a media briefing on Thursday that growth in electric vehicle sales is not materializing at the pace the company had initially anticipated, and noted that a significant portion of its North American customer base is unwilling to pay a premium for electric vehicles compared to alternatives.
“We’re not moving away from our second generation [EV] products,” CFO John Lawler said in the briefing, per CNBC. “We are, though, looking at the pace of capacity that we’re putting in place. We are going to push out some of that investment.”
Ford’s Blue Oval City project in Tennessee will still proceed as planned.
Ford’s EV business has been incurring losses, with approximately $1.3 billion lost in adjusted earnings during the last quarter in its electric vehicle business unit, marking nearly double the loss compared to the same period the previous year.
Meanwhile, one big company has optimism in the EV market.
BP, the oil and gas company, made a deal this week to acquire $100 million worth of electric vehicle chargers from Tesla, CNN reported.
Beginning in 2024, BP will install the 250 kilowatt fast chargers, typically referred to as “Superchargers” by Tesla. The specific quantity of charges remains undisclosed in the announcement.
BP intends to deploy the chargers at a range of BP-owned locations, while some of them will be placed at third-party sites, such as Hertz centers.
Madeline Garfinkle
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