Ford Motor Co. continues to make big bets on an electric vehicle future.
Ford CEO Jim Farley announced in Louisville on Aug. 11 the automaker plans to invest $5 billion and create roughly 4,000 jobs focused on EV production across the Louisville Assembly Plant and the BlueOval Battery Park in Michigan.
Switch Auto Insurance and Save Today!
“We took a radical approach to a very hard challenge: Create affordable vehicles that delight customers in every way that matters — design, innovation, flexibility, space, driving pleasure, and cost of ownership — and do it with American workers,” Farley said.
This announcement comes after Ford reported a recent loss of $1.3 billion in the second quarter on the EV unit of the company and announced a further delay in the production of two EV products to 2028.
Farley has previously teased the Aug. 11 announcement will be a “Model-T moment” for the company — a reference to the historic Ford vehicle that essentially launched the automaker 120 years ago.
More: Ford will have ‘Model-T moment’ on Aug. 11, CEO Jim Farley says
Here’s what we know about the historic EV investment from Ford:
Ford is creating a new Universal EV Platform that will allow a family of “affordable” vehicles to be produced and scaled to meet customer demand.
The new EV platform will allow for a reduction in parts compared to a typical vehicle, create a need for fewer workstations in the plant and increase assembly time by 15%.
Farley said Ford will be the first automaker to use prismatic LFP batteries to power the EVs. This battery type allows for both space and weight savings while being cheaper than other battery types currently on the market.
The first vehicle expected to be launched from this new universal platform is a midsize four-door EV pickup truck. The automaker is targeting a starting price of $30,000 and the truck will be assembled at the Louisville Assembly Plant off Fern Valley Road.
The truck is expected to be available to customers in the U.S. and overseas in 2027. Ford said the new to market truck will be “as fast as a Mustang EcoBoost” and have more passenger space than the competitor Toyota RAV4. Like many EVs, the truck will also feature a “frunk” or front trunk and have a truck bed.
Meet the competitor: All-new Toyota RAV4 unveiled in world premiere. What to know about Kentucky-made hybrid
Ford will also deploy a new assembly line model, more than a century after the company first pioneered the moving assembly line. The new Universal EV Production System is expected to simplify vehicle assembly for “safety, quality and speed.”
The new assembly line is being coined an “assembly tree” and will feature three sub-assembly lines that run down their own lines at the same time and then join together to make the final product.
The new method, and reduction of parts, has allowed Ford to develop a way for the front and rear of the vehicles to be assembled separately and then combined later down the line with the structural battery, which will be the vehicle’s floor.
Parts will now be moved down the assembly tree to workers in a kit that will contain all parts and tools needed, along with instructions for proper use, making the job simpler for employees.
Ford expects this new assembly model to increase production speeds at LAP by up to 40% when compared to the speed of production of the current Ford Escape and Lincoln Corsair, which are currently built on site.
With a new $1.9 billion project, Ford will expand LAP by 52,000 square feet and upgrade the plant’s digital infrastructure. This will make LAP the fastest network with the most access points for quality control scans of any Ford plant across the globe.
The Courier Journal previously reported Ford had filed plans to Louisville Metro Planning and Design Services in June that detailed the addition of new docks and large EV charging station.
The project secured $120 million in tax-based incentives at a special meeting Aug. 11 of The Kentucky Economic Development Finance Authority.
This supplemental project adds to an existing Kentucky Jobs Retention Act program agreement between state government and the company. The performance-based incentive allows the company to recover up to a cumulative $550 million based on the company’s overall $3.65 billion investment.
By hitting annual investment and job targets, the company can be eligible to keep some of the new tax revenue it generates by claiming eligible incentives against its income tax liability and/or wage assessments, according to the state.
Currently, LAP has 2,800 hourly workers and 200 salaried workers, a Ford spokesperson said.The announcement from Aug. 11, and corresponding incentives approved for the state, indicates the EV project at LAP will start with 2,200 employees — 600 fewer hourly jobs than are there currently.Ford spokesperson Mark Truby said the company is not planning layoffs but instead some workers will likely take a buyout offer while others will have the option to transfer to the Kentucky Truck Plant or “other plants in the area.”“This project will start with 2,200 hourly workers, so 600 fewer workers than we have today, but it’s a lot of headroom to grow,” Truby said. “There’s nothing to say today that this is the only top hat to be built in Louisville, but we’re focused on this product today and there is room to grow.”
During the 2023 contract negotiations with the UAW, which eventually led to Ford workers across the country being called out on strike, the union and automaker struck a deal that some claimed put Louisville “truly at the center of the universe for EV production and EV innovation,” The Courier Journal reported in 2023.
From 2023: How new UAW Ford agreement makes Louisville ‘center of the universe’ for electric vehicles
The UAW and Ford agreed to pump major investments and changes into the Louisville Assembly Plant following the end of the production lifecycle of the Ford Escape and Lincoln Corsair.
LAP was promised a $1.2 billion investment over the life of the 2023 contract and an “all-new EV product.”
The EV industry has sprouted up quickly across Kentucky, largely due to Ford’s investment in the state. Todd Dunn, the president of UAW Local 862, which represents workers at LAP and the Kentucky Truck Plant where Super Duty trucks are made, previously said “Kentucky is the new Michigan,” due to the growth of the EV sector in the state.
In June, documents filed with Louisville Metro Government showed Ford is already in the early stages of retooling LAP to go from producing gas powered vehicles to EVs with the planned addition of 12,000 square feet of canopy to shelter 16 charging units and a substation, The Courier Journal first reported.
Dunn and International UAW President Shawn Fain have previously shared excitement over maintaining a product commitment for LAP and job security for workers.
This story will be updated.
Detroit Free Press reporter Jamie LaReau contributed to this report. Contact business reporter Olivia Evans at oevans@courier-journal.com or on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter at @oliviamevans_.
This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Ford shares new EV truck plans in Louisville, $5B investment and more