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Darren Palmer on the EV Revolution (Podcast) · Masters in Business

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: M This is Mesters in Business with Very Results on
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Bluebird Radio. This week on the podcasts, I say it
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: every week, but it's true. I have an extra special guest.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: His name is Darren Palmer. He is the head of
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Electric Vehicle Development at Ford, where he helped to introduce
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: such vehicles as the Mustang Maki, the F one fifty Lightning,
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: the transit van. They are working on everything from an
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: electric explorer. If you would like to get your hands
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: on an electrified Bronco, well you better listen to this
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: because this is absolutely a fascinating conversation, not just about cars,
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: but about technology and software and consumer relations and design
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: and really I don't think there's an area we didn't
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: touch on. I found it utterly, utterly intriguing, and I
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  Speaker 1: think you will also, so, with no further ado, this
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: is Ford's director of Electric Vehicle Development, Darren Palmer. This
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: is Mesters in Business with very Renaults on Bloomberg Radio.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: My extra special guest this week is Darren Palmer. He
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: is the General manager of Battery electric Vehicles at Board.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: He is overseeing Ford's thirty billion dollars shift to electrification.
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  Speaker 1: He helped launch the Mustang mach e, the Transit and
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: the F one fifty Lightning. He holds an MBA from
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  Speaker 1: Henley Management College in the UK, as well as an
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: electrical Electronics and Technology degree from Birmingham University. Darren Palmer,
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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Bloomberg. Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.
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  Speaker 1: So let's start with your background. You you get an
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: engineering degree in the ninety nineties. Was the plan always
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: to go into automobile manufacturing or or or were you
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: focused on a different sector? But it sounds so long
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: ago now when you say the nineties. Um yeah, So
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: my fan was always to go into engineering. I think
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: a lot of people in engineering know that they're destined
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: for that. I really like metatronics at the time. Um so,
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: the fusion of electronics and electrical with creating movement as well.
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: So I knew I wanted him to go into something
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: of complex engineering. And I think somebody once said to me, uh,
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: you know, planes take too long, trains don't have as
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: much interest. But cars are constantly changing over and they're
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: a huge purchase in people's lives. So that's what made
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: me look towards cars. And I looked at a number
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: of car companies, but I think I always knew I
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: wanted to go into water, and I've got a few
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: offers that Ford was a t The company had a
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: great reputation and furthermore, makes cars for everybody, and I
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: was interested in making cars for everybody, not just a
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: privileged for you really interesting and you have a reputation
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: as a petrol head, you're a Mustang guy. What led
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: you to gravitate towards e VS over these years? Well,
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: I've I've I've been very lucky in this career, twenty
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: nine years in the forward, and every time the last
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: challenge finished, they offered me another challenge. So I ended
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: up working all over the world on every type of cars, vans, commercials,
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: every class, B, C, C, D class cars are increasingly larger,
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: and then luxury and every all around the world India, China,
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: South America, US, Australia, so and at one point I
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: had plants on four continents, five continents, and development center
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: on four continents. So all of those different parts of
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: experience led me to I was starting to work on
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: hybrids and the company said, we want to do something, friend,
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: we need to have a completely new approach to electric cars.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: Because we were trying and we were getting nowhere. They
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: decided they to do something called Team Edison, and they
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: asked with my background of international and really open mindedness
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: was the key there. We formed a team called Team
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: Edison to determine the future of electric cars for Forward.
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: So that that was about four four years ago, and
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: that was four and a half and that was my
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: moving to electric cars. Tell us about Team Edison obviously
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: a little bit of a reference to to a famous
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: American entrepreneur, what what is Team Edison at Forward? So
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: what was happening was we were trying to develop electric cars,
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: but they were being measured by the same measures as
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: gas cars, so they wouldn't meet the hurdles, the investment hurdles,
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: the profit hurdles, the volume predictions. So we were getting
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: nowhere and we in fact we were going to make
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: a Ford Focus their version two, and we knew that
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: it was becoming increasingly I'm aware that that really isn't
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: what the market wanted. So we had to change something,
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: and we knew it was a cultural change. So we
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: decided we either buy an electric car company, but then
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: you have to transfer tens of thousands of people in
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: one day, or we try something different. We try we
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: create a startup within Ford Motor Company and then that's
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: what we decided to do. So a gent called Ted Cannis,
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: really one of our top business leaders, was put in
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: as the head of that group and he set about
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: to create recruiting people internal and external to head up
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: Team Medicine. I was the first one in and when
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: he told me the proposal, um, he convinced me to
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: come in and that's where the journey started. And we
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: had some external people, but not huge amount because it's
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: all about the first you've got to work out what
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: to do, and then you've got to make it happen
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: in a hundred year old company, and I can tell
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: you making it happen was harder than determining what to do.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: So we so we formed, and we moved ourselves outside
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: of the main buildings and we formed a different culture,
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: really building it up from the ground. We had about
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: people handpicked each one and we were inspired by startups
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: in California, so we spent time there early on to
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: determine how they work, which is very different, and we
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: set up a culture extremely similar to that. We also
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: went to China to Norway where electric cars were prevalent
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: to see what others are doing, and then we we
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: set about determining where to go. At the time, it
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: was an eleven billion dollar investment in electric cars. It's
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: now today announced a few days ago to fifty billion.
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: I have thirty billion down in my notes, but fifties
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  Speaker 1: a lot of money. The team Edison. The first project
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: was that the Mustang or was it leader was the
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: medicine after the Mustang Marquis. So the first thing to
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: do was to determine where to play and how to win.
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: And that meant we had to first understand I mean
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: for the whole portfolio without the time was eleven billion dollars,
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: so three or four cars coming through, and the battery
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: infrastructure and the charging infrastructure and all those things we
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: had to do. So it was actually to work out
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: where to play and how to win, and we quickly
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: worked out. We went to California and I was talking
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: to customers in California and quizzing them about their cars,
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: and we determined quite quickly that they had transitioned to
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: BEV and they would never come back. They were also
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: delighted with their products and it felt like they'd moved
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: from a flip phone to a smartphone like an I
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: phone or similar and at any price, they would never
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: move back, which was very similar to the phone analogy,
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: and I asked one of them. I offered them, Hey,
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: you know, we need your car for testing, so I'll
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: give you. I'll give you a free BMW M three
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: and two thirds of your money back. And he said,
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: I'm not interested. How can that be? Said, well, I'm
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: a I'm authorized to offer you of your money back
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: and free BMWM three. He said I'm not interested, and
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: I said how can that be? And he said, well,
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: because I've discovered the future. UM, I can afford it
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: and I deserve it. And we realized at that point
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: these people they're never going to buy the traditional vehicles
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: that we had. They're buying a technology product. And we
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: brought that realization back and said we need to completely
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: change our plan. And that led us to leading with
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: our icons. So we made a plan of which vehicles
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: to attack in which order, and we made the strategic
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: choice that every vehicle from forward will do things that
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: gas never did, enabled by the technology. So none of
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: them will be a car just with an electric motor
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: in it. That's not what crustomers want. So that's what
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: we did. In the first thing we did into medicine,
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: which was the eleven billion dollars, and made the first
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: three cars, the Mustard macke which you may have seen
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: one recommended, the only electric car recommended in America, and
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: now the last last week, and then the Transit is
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: now just launching. We're nearly sold out already and it
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: is likely to be a leader in its field. It's
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: already nearly global in its field now with a gas vehicle.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: And then their fifty Lightning, which is of course the
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: big one for us, where we've got over two orders.
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: Now we had to switch the system off. So let's
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: talk about those three big cars that you ever saw
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: the launch on, starting with the Mustang mac Markie, which
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: won a number of awards. I had a loaner of
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: those cars last year and thought it was a really
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: interesting and very well made ev tell us about the
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: challenges you ran into when you were first thinking about
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: putting that car out. Uh, it really was a substantial
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: break from what Ford had done in the past. Yeah,
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: So we had originally planned a focus their part two,
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: but we quickly realized due to human centric work, we
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: were doing and human centric work puts you out with
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: customers very early and you just talk with them about
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: how they feel about things that you know, you're not
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: asking them exactly what they want, You're just talking about
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: to them about their lives and what they see. We
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: discovered pretty quickly what they were looking for in this
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: next generation was a technology product first. And you know,
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: there's one company out there which is really doing that,
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: which is Tesla. They've been a leader in that space.
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: And we noticed how customers of those vehicles were. They
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: really liked the experience they got, and we said, we
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: in that vehicle we're going to make, it needs to
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: be a technology first vehicle, but we want to bring
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: what is our spin on there? What is Ford? What
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: does Ford bring to the table? Tesla have their attributes,
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: but Ford need to have their own. And we said
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: to ourselves, um, what brands do we have that could
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: be worthy of what we're going to make and that
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: could be synergistic. So the one that came to mind
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: pretty quickly was Mustang. And the first time we said that,
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: it sounded um crazy, you know, and some people were
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: very shocked by that. So we asked ourselves, what if
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: it was a stone, and then we we started with
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: the exterior design actually, and we went downstairs to the
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: design team who were working on a focus both Part two,
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: and I could tell you they weren't the most fired up.
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: And then we said what if? And again they know
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: they started to come to the table, and we said,
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: what if we mixed it's going to be an suv
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: because that's the segment growth, the greatest segment growth and
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: where customers are going, especially millennial, So we wanted it
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: to be there. We knew that, so it's we're there. Therefore,
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: we're talking about an suv, musting what might it look like?
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: And in that first day they started sketching and we
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: put together some of the must plank cues with that suv,
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: and then we started to like what we saw, and
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: then we that they the designers got lost in it
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: and then said okay, leave us. We left them, and
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: then the said we're going to make a clay of
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: that vehicle. And so we went away for the weekend
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: and we came back early six five six am on
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: Monday morning and said, don't look at it. Well, we
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: walked away and they were putting dia Knock onto it,
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: which is the kind of silver foil that simulates a vehicle.
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: And when we all turned around and we saw that
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: first execution, we said, oh my, oh, my word, that
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: that couldn't work. That could work. That was from the
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: first weekend, and we said, my word, that could work.
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: And by the way, the designers had gone from not
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: the most excited, too off the wall, excited, didn't have
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: time to talk to us, just busy creating. They immediately
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: took the DIA knock off again and started carrying on
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: with the clay and they're off. So we went to
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: the next department and we went interior and and we said,
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: what have we got? They showed us and we said,
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: you know, that doesn't really look that's not a Mustang.
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: That's not worthy of that. And we said, how would
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: you change it? There was a Mustang, and same thing happened.
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: They started to get excited by the way. Both of them,
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: the exterior designers and the interior were both the people
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: who did Mustang, so we didn't need to explain to
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: them what the Mustang was. It was the same people,
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: and they started to bring a lot of those cues
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: in so they kicked off. There were the same the
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: same excitement. We went to the next department and we
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: said we need technology and that was a problem. We
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: went and said, what have we got that would be
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: a high tech tech forward solution that is over their
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: updateable and we'll work for years to come and upgraded.
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: And I'm afraid we didn't have anything. But our system
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: at the time was not going to do the job.
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: So that was the biggest challenge for us. And and
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: we we went downstairs to the development team and we
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: said in team medicine, we work without grade structure, all
• 14:47
  Speaker 1: together on the problems and anybody can speak up without
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: fear of anything, reprise or anything. So we encourage people
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: to speak up. So we pulled together. We went downstairs
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: to the to the main team and we work asked
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: the programmers who were working on very for it to
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: come into a room and we shut the door. We
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: explained how we work. Anyone can speak up, and I
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: said to them, hey, guys, we need a next gen
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: operating system that's world class on this car is launching
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: in two and a half years. How how might we
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: do that? And they were silent for a while. People
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: take time before they're comfortable, and one of them said,
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: not working the way we work. I said, that's interesting.
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: How would you do that? Then they said, you'd have
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: to work like a software company and we said, like what, Well,
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: they work in one room with the designers, the human
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: machinery are facing the programmers in one team, together with
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: the equipment they need, the facilities they need, in the
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: funding they need, without frankly, management interference. And I said,
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: what if we do that? And they said, We're never
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: going to do that here. I said, well, what if
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: we said we'd give you everything you want because you
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: do that. They said, well, if you could do it,
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: then then yes we would. And I said, well if
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: would you start Monday? If we could do that? Said yes,
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: and then I said, and I never forget this. It
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: made me laugh. I said, hey, hold on a minute,
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: hold on, how do I know that you actually know
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: how to do that? And he said, John, John, show
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: him John. And so he looks over to the other gentleman.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: He puts down his delaptop and he pulls out an
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: alien where from his side bag, and as he's opening it,
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: Tom says to him, yeah, he's just come back from
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: a gaming convention in South Korea, like, oh okay, And
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: he then shows me some of the things they've worked on,
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: and they they have and it looked like something out
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: of Marvel, and okay, I got it, you guys know.
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: So we then went upstairs and we went to our
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: leadership team and we said, well, you know, we really
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: we're into big trouble. We need this system in two
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: and a half years and the team, you know, can't
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: do it the way they work. And he said, well,
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: have you got a proposal? We said, yeah, we have
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: to work in a different way and we need me
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: maybe seven million dollars of immediate funding to just trund
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: everything they need. So he said, okay, just do it,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: do it now. So okay, so went upstairs to the
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: VP of engineering and we said the same thing. He said,
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: start now, get on with it. So we went back
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: down to the team that evening and said we're ready
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: to go. Please start um And Monday morning they started.
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: And what I've learned from many of the startups, the
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: way to work nimble is that leaders serve the employees
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: who who are who are creating for the customer. My
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: job is to clear the path in front of them.
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: So I went every morning, what do you need today?
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: We need better computers, do you know where to get them? Yes?
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: Going by? Now? What else do you need? We need
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: some screens that emulate the screens we're building for a
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: good going by. Do you know how to get them? Yes?
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: I can buy them. Best play gone by him now
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: And they were delighted to have that ability. And then
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: the next day asked what do you need, Hey, we
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: need a server computer to serve some of the interfaces. Okay,
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: give it to them. And then the third day they said,
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: what do you need? Said old pizza and coffee kind
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: of joking. Okay, you get pizza and coffee, and what
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: else you need? The answer is what do you need
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: to get it? And and they've never worked like that
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: in Ford. And then the fourth day, what you need nothing,
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: just leave us alone. Okay, fifth day, what you need?
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: Something else? And so on. We just kept doing that
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: and then we've created no presentations. When they want to
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: demonstrate something, they just showed it to us. And the
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: progress was I've never seen anything like it in my
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: in my career. Within two weeks they had running prototypes
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: that were touchable interfaces that they had created. One of
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: them created the main interface, you know, while he was
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: working off site at home, and he decided to create
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: an enhage temail fire for the Internet, the main language
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: for websites, because that was convenient to create and he
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: had a complete working interface in two weeks, and because
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: it was hate Temail five, it could reconfigure like a
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: web page does, which most cars do not do. And
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: then and then within three weeks they were testing it
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: with customers in Chicago and streaming it live while the
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: whole team watched the customers. And at one point a
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: customer got caught up on some of the interface, and
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: the guy said, how can you fix that? And he
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: corrected the code, live redeployed, and because it was live
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: fed from a server, it updated the interface in the
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: hands of the customer who then was not caught on
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: it and we could carry on with the work. I've
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: never seen anything like it. They did three rounds of
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: that testing live watching customers in Europe, in China, and
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: in US, and in twelve weeks created an all new interface,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: which you know, he's getting extremely good reports now from
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: consumer reports and and JD Power one of the best
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: curR interfaces in the world. So it was incredible. I've
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: never seen anything like it in my career. And I
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: learned a lot through that process. And last year, despite
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: the pandemic and despite um the supply issues. I think
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: you guys sold something like twenty seven thousand Mustangs is
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: that right in the US? Yes, a little bit more,
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: and we were nearly fifty globally from the same plant.
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: We're completely sold out and we're trying to meet that
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: demand with what we've actually we're actually we've agreed and
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: we have funded, and we're going to increase production to
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: over two hundred thousands. Wow, that's a huge number. So
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: the market the Marquee is very much a crossover. Are
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: there any plans to electrify the traditional Mustang pony car?
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: The two door sports car? So you get that asked
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: that one a lot. So the next cars along after
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: we've done the Lightning is the three row car, so
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: the size of an Explorer, that type of car. That's
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: the next one along. We've we've already announced that one,
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: and then we have a lot of calls for other cars.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: You can imagine, there's huge calls for an electric Broncho,
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: and there's others which we haven't announced yet. And we've
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: got a fifty billion dollar roadmap of many cars including
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: Lincoln's the the Mustang Sports Coupay, and that needs a
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: very low battery to make that to what we want
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: it to be. And uh, and we have quite high
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: aspirations for what we would want that to be. And
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: so we're only going to do that when the technology
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: will allow. We know customers really want, they want over
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: three miles, you may, that makes them comfortable and happy.
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: And that's always been a product that has punched above
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: its weight and gives performance of normally much more expensive
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: cars and with the whole imagery of Mustang. So we're
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: not doing it yet, nothing nothing to declare on the
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: timing of that yet. We're going to do it, but
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: we'll only do it when the technology allows us to
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: make it incredible. You know, the Marquee has by all
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: measures been a wild success, if there's any fly in
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: the ointment, and this kind of surprised me. It was
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: all the pushback on the Marquee over the Mustang name.
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: What you're a Mustang guy, what was your reaction to
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: the sort of you know, old school enthusiasts who were
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: offended by a crossover we're using the name Mustang. Well,
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: I understand, I very much understand it. I'm extremely active
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: on listening on social media was something we learned a
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: lot in the way startups do it all the time.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: And from the first weekend we launched, we were watching
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: social media live and somebody, you know, for example, had
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: a problem on the first Saturday, and we asked permission
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: to speak to them and we contacted them, which they loved,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: and we fixed it. So I'm extremely aware of negative
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: feedback from current owners. So what I set off about
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: doing a year ago was talking to lots of them,
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: and we actually brought in the presidents of both Mustang
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: clubs and amazing guys, and we brought them actually to
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: the launch in California, and we brought them along and
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: they came to see me and said, Darren, you know,
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: I understand what you're doing, but I can't really endorse it,
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: and you know, I just wanted to let you know that,
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: but I do appreciate what you're doing here. So that
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: was at the beginning. At the end of the two days,
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: one of them brought two and one of them brought one,
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: and they said wow, yeah and and and they said,
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: so listen, this vehicle supports the other Mustang. We couldn't
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: be selling the V eight Mustang very much longer without
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: the support of these TV so it protects the current Mustang.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: By the way, we still sell the current Mustang, so
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: it's a companion is growing the brand into in a
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: new space. And I can't tell you the joy of
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: the of the customers. Literally nine of them recommend it
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: to friends and families and everyone will listen to them.
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: So that's the highest satisfaction car I'm ever aware of
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: that We've had well, I'll tell you card people love,
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: I'll tell you personally. Having sat in you know, everything
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: that's out there, um and having had the Marquee, the
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: sort of middle not the GT the middle of the
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: of the road version for a week, I came away
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: very impressed with the old quality, the fit and finish.
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: It just felt like a substantial vehicle that was well
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: made and was I don't want to say luxurious, but
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: it kind of reminded me of a Volvo where everything
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: is very well put together, very well thought out. There's
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: a degree of minimalism in it that was very effective,
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: and it very much had its own personality. I came
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: away really impressed with that and wanna try a GT
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: out and see what what the higher horsepower is like,
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: but you know the Mustang. Everybody knows a lot about
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: the sexy new uh hotness is the one Lightning. The
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: four f one fifty has been the best selling vehicle
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: in America for I don't know, forty years, running some
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: crazy number. You must have very very high hopes and
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: expectations for the Lightning. Tell us a little bit about
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: the development of that vehicle. Yeah, the Mackie is like
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: a practice compared to the Lightning. So we are very
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: aware of Lightning from fifties status as America's number one
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: vehicle for over four decades, and the love for that
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: product is indescribable. I know that because I see the
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: customers talking. So when we started that project, we knew
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: what was ahead of us, and everyone was warning us,
• 26:33
  Speaker 1: you might better make sure that vehicle is worthy. So
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: what people expected is built for tough, and of course
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: it's been punished as every piece is the same as
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: a gas. It will pass all of the things the
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: gas does. Of course it does, and we put it
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: down Silver Creek, which is hideous, to be honest. We
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: have robots drive them now because it's it's too brutal
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: for humans in an accelerated test. That's how brutal they
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: are now, and all their from clifts do that, but
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: so does the lightning. We've made a battery case system
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: that's impervious and can go underwater, and it had We
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: know it has to be tough and reliable, and that's
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: as given. But what people didn't expect is that mantra
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: that we put forward. Every electric car from forward has
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: to do things that gas could never do, because that's
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: what attracts people in We're aware, you know, we believe
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: this could be the vehicle that attracts mainstream America into
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: beds because I can tell you thirty seconds in the
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: driver's seat will convert the most hardened the enthusiasts into
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: a wow because it feels like a magic carpet when
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: you drive off, because it's an isolated subframe, no vibrations
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: at all, near silence. You're waiting for the noise to come,
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: and then you look at the speedometer and you're at
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: sixty miles and there's no noise. It's quieter than my
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: than a navigator compared to it's amazing. And because there's
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: one gear and the accelerator pedal reacts in a fraction
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: of a second. It's unbelievable even the most hardened electric enthusiast.
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: And I've had some really amazing journalists in there. They're
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: ready to be amazed, and they come away and say,
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: oh my god, I was ready, and I'm still amazed
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: because it fumps you in the back, like you've had
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: seven dred and seventy five pound of talk in a
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: fraction of a second with one gear. I can't really
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: describe that. And you think and you're ready for it,
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: you say, yeah, I'm ready, but it surprises you and
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: you just want more. And so the great thing about
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: it is that you can show customers in a few
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: seconds and you've converted them. That's all it takes. You
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: don't need to describe anymore. And that's going to do
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: a lot for electric vehicles. And so because we have
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: a huge dealer network, I'm able to put one. I've
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: decided to put one in every dealer in America that's
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: an e v D, which is pretty much all of them,
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: so that people can go down there and try it,
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: and the dealers are going to call their customers and
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: those who say hey, electrics not for me, I say, good, good,
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: come along here's the key, and see what you say
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: after you've driven it. And I've tried it out on
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: the most hardened people I can find, and they all
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: and they all opens their eyes hugely. I did the
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: same with mustind by the way, I found the most
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: V eight petrol in the veins gas in the veins
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: enthusedists I could find, and I gave them a mackey
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: and said try that, and they went away. And I'm
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: not interested. I don't I'm not interested in these things.
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: You know. I'm always gonna love gas all my life.
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: I do racing. I hear, I hear. I give them
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: a macky GT Performance Edition and they come back three
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: hours later with their mouth open and say, oh my god.
• 30:02
  Speaker 1: One guy came back. He said to me, oh my god,
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: the new definition, the new definition of performances silence. I
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: might have to write that down, he and then he
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: texted me later he got into his you know, hold
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: the coupe and he said, oh my god, I feel
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: like I just stepped back ten years. So that was
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: the most hardened guy. Fine, And I said to him, hey,
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: you know, you think you're a petrol head. Actually you're not.
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: You're a performance spleusiast and it just so happens that
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: the new performance benchmark is now is now electric. So
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: he said, oh my god, that's it. And so that's
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: how we knew it would it would work because real
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: people who are passionate about that we loved it when
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: they experienced it, and so that was a there's a
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: barrier on the market must end because you know that preconception.
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: But on the earth Fruit there's no barrier. People are like, well,
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: maybe I try it. They tried Echo Bruce once and
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: we changed their mind about the co boost and so
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: they quote that to me, and so I'm willing to
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: give it a go now. And I put them in
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: there in seconds and they're like, I gotta have it.
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: So I'm really excited about that. And for people who
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: want to see that torture test, just go to YouTube
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: and search for Silver Creek for torture test and you'll
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: see what they do to these poor trucks. It's it's
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: quite astonishing to see the videos. All right, So we
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: have the Mustang out, we have the F one fifty out.
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: Although I think a lot of people are still waiting.
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: You guys are pretty much sold out of the next
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: hundred thousand or some crazy number. Where where are you
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: with the current pre sales and sales. Yeah, so it
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: surprised us. So we knew that one day people will
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: want over a hundred thousand of these, We did not
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: expect that in two literally two some people one one.
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: We we totally undercalled it, so did the whole industry,
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: to be honest, and so we now we realize, you know,
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: they're ready now because the point of the truck was
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: the performance and power. Yes, but that's not even what
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: people talk about. What they talk about is this megapower
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: front because it changes it into a new type of vehicle.
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: You've now got a luggage space which is basically the
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: size of most medium sized suv extra and it and
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: it's electronic way it lifts and closes, so you can
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: use it to put your groceries in or anything you
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: want that people want to put golf clubs in their
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: two sets and other things. So it changes the product.
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: People are very excited about front gating as well. I noticed.
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: And then this backup power system where it uses bidirectional
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: power and it will back up your home like a
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: like a whole house generator for three days or up
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: to ten days. This is what people are talking about.
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: And then we decided to put it at a price
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: that is basically equivalent to gas including the incentive. So
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: and no one expected that either. People expected twenty more
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: and that meant the barriers of price have gone. So
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: it's just about adoption and are you ready, And that
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: led to two orders before we switched it off. So
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: we started off a lower run rate and this year
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: we just we're opening the ordering in batches because we
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: want fairness. I mean, people are really really excited about
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: it and we want fairness. So it will be mainly
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: from the date when you a person order registered and
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: it's a reservation they have at the moment, not in order,
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: and then we open up the ability for those those
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: customers to order and then they specify their the important
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: order and then we give them a date about approximate
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: date which is really important to them. And once they
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: ordered the date and we're as long as our launch
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: goes well, we'll be on during those dates. UM. So
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: that's I saw you on. We've opened up the twenty
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: two model year and we we sold them out now um,
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: and those customers all have dates and we'll be opening
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: up the next set um in August, around August, and
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: then the next set of customers will be able to
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: order and that's a bigger batch um. And then the
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: really big news is we have put in a capacity increase,
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: a massive capacity capacity increase which will hit around July
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: next year, and we're going up to a hundred and
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: fifty thousand units a year run rate. So on when
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: that wave hits, which will be from July next year,
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: we will be able to satisfy demand in a much
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: bigger way. And so we'll keep opening these waves of orders,
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: keeping it fair and letting customers, keeping them informed about
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: when they're going to get it, and we'll keep doing
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: that until we fulfill all the orders. But there will
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: be a big, big step up when we start ordering
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: for the next July builds. That will be a much
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: larger capacity uplift. So so last current e V I
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: have to ask is the transit which is your large
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: sized commercial van which I think most car enthusiasts overlook.
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: That's a workhorse. You guys have sold a bajillion of those.
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: What what was the thinking in terms of creating the
• 35:31
  Speaker 1: transit van and what are your expectations for sales there, Yeah,
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: so I am just as excited about that product. So
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: because of how I see changing people's lives. So we
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: created Forward Pro under ted Cannie, my great colleague who
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: now runs out of CEO of Ford Pro, and that's
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: to focus on our fleet customers and they're thinking behind
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: that big Forward is somewhat half of commercial vehicles and
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: the best selling commercial vehicles in the world, both in
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: US and most of the rest of the world. So
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: we needed to lead and we saw an opportunity to
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: create a transit van using the components from the MACKI
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: and that meant we could get really good scale and
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: if one of them didn't sell, we could flex between
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: them quite hell. In the end, this is not our problem.
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: Our problem is not enough of either of them. Um
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: So that's that's good, and that's but it uses a
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: similar battery to the MACKI high tech pout cells, and
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: it uses the motor system which is evolved from the MACKI,
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: and they integrate I C controllers from the MACKI, which
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: means great price, great scale, and it means we can
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: offer a van. And this is what I'm so proud of.
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: The price of these products is what I'm just as
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: proud of because it means it can get into everybody's hands.
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: That's what's important to us. So the transit it in
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: a lot of businesses will actually start paying back from
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: the first day. You're not talking about hey, in five years,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: in three years, I'm talking about the first day, and
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: the running costs of something like half and there are
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: and the time off the road for servicing and so
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: on is much much less, so they have gone down
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: really well. Um in those businesses, you must match the
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: mileage to the available very carefully. You do not carry
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: extra battery. That's inefficient, you just carrying it around for nothing.
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: And many of those routes are very known and so
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: a certain amount of the market that product is ready
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: to serve, not the whole market yet, but a large,
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: large proportion. So we expected that to go well, and
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: that again has gone much better than expected. We're having
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: to triple volume for that vehicle as well, and we're
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: working on now. And but what I hadn't expected is
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: all the new use cases. So every day we're seeing
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: new use cases and the obvious ones. I mean, we
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: we served the whole market delivery, which is one that
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: people are very visible. This is only ten of our sales.
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: Of the market, there's much bigger market is every other
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: use you can think of for ava um And so
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: that's what we serve with transit. But I'll give you
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: a new use case. So we were launching ford Pro
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: in Sonoma a couple of weeks ago. Oh and we
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: decided to do that Ted lead This decided to do
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: it with a wine growing region. So we did it
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: with Francis coppler um And and his estate. And he
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: showed us they have an innovation where they to grow
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: better wine, make better wine day. At the moment when
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: they take the wine in parcels they put them in,
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: they have to mix three parcels together in one vat
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: because they don't have enough bats. Nearly all wine growers
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: do that. Trouble is you don't know which is the
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: good parcel until a year later, so you have to
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: mix them together and now you you mixed too good
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: and weren't bad, and you don't know in the wine
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: is mediocre. So his innovation that he came up with
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: his team is to build a vat for every parcel.
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: Now you have one parcel per vact. Trouble is you're
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: not allowed to build above ground, because beautiful region. So
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: he dug into a hillside and built it underground. So
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: he showed us a new facility is amazing, looks like
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: a James Bond villain layer. And he and there's only
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: you know, there's only two bighcles you can use under there.
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: One is a diesel van. Who wants a diesel van underground?
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: That stage four is safe, so you can do that,
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: you just don't want to, or an electric van. So
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: he converted his entire fleet to electric, I mean it
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: ly and then never look back. And so we announced this,
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: We launched this with him a little while back, and
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: and then of course there's I can't remember the number,
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: but something insane number like thirty wine growing companies in
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: US something like that. Don't quote me, but basically they
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: all started contacting him and what are you doing. Oh, yes,
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: I'm making one that per parcel, so my wine is
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: just going to be top quality next year. Well they
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: took notice of that. Then the next group and the
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: next group and the next group said hey, why don't
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: we do the same, And then he said what kind
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: of vehicles do you need? And of course he said
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: electric transit. So we now have orders coming in all
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: over the Blade for electric transits for wine growing. And
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: that's just one. That's just one use and we hadn't
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: even thought that one. And then any time you need
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: to bring a vehicle indoors, you can bring it indoors
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: and they have power pro power and board, which means
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: you bring them indoors and plug power tools in the
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: back and they have enough power to run proper power tools.
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: So you imagine building factories, building homes. You just put
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: up the transit and start cutting wood up through from
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: the back of the transit. No generators, no noise, completely independent.
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: So that's the use cases where we expected to see.
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: We're seeing huge ones. And by the one that I
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: loved mostly, you gotta be really excited. Recently was on
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: the fifty. That one has nine point six killer lots
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: of power. That that's a whole home. And there's I
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: saw a startup where instead of getting takeaway food, imagine
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: you have two couples over for dinner. Instead of getting
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: takeaway food, this business you you booked them online. They
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: come to your driveway, open up the kitchen in the
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: back and cook you dinner of your choice of that type,
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: and they and they feed it. You know, they give
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: you the just cooked food on your driveway, and they're
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: going to use electric from fifties because the electric powers
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: enough to parrel the cooking equipment, induction hobs, so on.
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: How cool is that? I can just imagine that scaling
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: all over America, don't you. It's really really interesting. So
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: let's talk a little bit about batteries. You became general
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: manager of Battery VS. Tell us about the thinking behind
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: that new job and where it's going. Yeah, so, um,
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: that that job. I used to be the product development
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: director for Team Edicine. So my role was in the
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: design and development of the new cars, leading the teams.
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: Obviously a large team is involved in that. Um. But
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: in late later on they decided they would like me
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: to take the vehicles to market. There are so many
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: elements there. There's the charge network, and there's buying online
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: and how BEV customers want to be treated differently. So
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: became a general manager, which means it was everything to
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: do with the can after the customer and bringing those
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: vehicles that we're designed to market. Um. So that meant
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: I talk with customers the whole time. I watched social
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: media all the time and I'm still very linked to
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: the development teams to just make sure that we're learning
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: quickly and we're evolving those vehicles. That that's really what
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: the job is about. The fantastic job, by the way,
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: I'm really enjoying it. So let's talk about the announcement
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: that was made fairly recently. Ford's leadership decided it was
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: time to go all in on t v s and
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: there I guess splitting into two companies. Am I am
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: I getting it right? Tell us about the new structure
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: that's coming. Yeah, So Team Medicine lad the first round
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: which delivered at least these first three products that you're
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: seeing the markets. We actually really well to it, and
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: then it was seen as now is the time to
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: organize ourselves to really comp He were the best out
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: there for the next set of products because He's really
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: a transformation, and it was determined Jim Farley led the
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: team to say, hey, I don't want people walking waking
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: up in the morning and having to think about how
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: to grow gas and how to grow BEV because they're
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: so different. The BEV is not just a normal gas
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: car with the electric motoring system. It's a completely new
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: technology product. So he wanted to organize the teams so
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: that they only are thinking about one of those. So
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: that's how the team have organized. One is called Ford
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: Blue and one is called Model E. That's the electric
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: one obviously, UM, and there's also Ford Pro and Ford
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: pros all about the commercial customers and their their sales
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: and support. They don't do the development that will be
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: done in the base in Blue or in Mode and
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: it's an internal company organization. I would all it UM.
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: And so the Model A team will be focused on
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: everything about t vs, every aspect, from the selection of
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: motors and controllers and electronics for efficiency, to the design
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: and development of the vehicles, to the network charging this
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: bidirectional power system that we've gotten, how that will work
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: with customers, and improving the current vehicles because all of
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: our electric vehicles are over the air update able, and
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: when we say we plan on delivering lots of updates
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: for customers, we really mean that. And we have a
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: huge cycled plan of updates and improvements to those vehicles
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: to roll out, and so that will also be under
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: Modeling UM and so it's just to allow the team
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: to really focus. We also will be setting up the
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: same culture within that team, as we did in in
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: team medicine, which is very flat structure leadership, supporting foyees
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: to make changes for the customer, very efficient approval, and
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: very can do an inclusive mindset that that brings in
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: people from all walks of life and ethnicities to bear
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: on the product development. We're doing so exactly like to medicine,
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: to be honest, just on steroids. Um. So that's the
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: plan and as part of that, I'm taking a new role.
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: I go back now to product development and I'll be
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: a VP of Product Development, Global product development for electric
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: cars now under Doug Field. Can't and I can't wait
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: to start. So we'll talk more about some upcoming cars
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: a little later. Let's let's stay with the concept of
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: the infrastructure for evs, and that's both battery and charging stations.
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: How long do we think it's going to take before
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: charging stations are as ubiquitous as gas stations? And I
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: should preface that by saying Ford is part of a
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: group that all have interoperable technology, and there's about I
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: think charging stations and their consortium. Is that about right? Yes?
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: So there's so we were we formed the Blue Oval
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: Charging Network and we considered how will we support the
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: growth of the network, who has to be huge investment
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: and across the whole of the country and also global actually,
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: and how might we support that? So one way we
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: could build our own networks. You know, we have resources.
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: We could do that, but then would be a Ford
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: network and the Tesla network and GM network, and that's
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: that's not good for customers. We just want the charging
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: network to be everywhere. So instead we chose to put
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: together every best network in America, every one of them,
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: and we put them together under one system, is under
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: the Blue Oval Ford Charge Network, and it's under the
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: forward Pass app. So when you buy a vehicle you
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: get free charging certain amounts, but more importantly, under one system,
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: you've got automatic payment across that whole network. All the
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: best ones are plug and charge. Now we were the
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: first people to launch that. So you just plug it
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: in and the car detects, automatically sets up and page
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: and just plug and walk away. Then you can monitor
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: your car over the over the year. Um. So that
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: was our strategy. And the reason is is because huge
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: investment is going to come into that now now that
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: companies see the cars coming, they're going to put huge
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: investment in so even before we talked on our podcast,
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: we had and sixty but we're already up to nine
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: now plugs because it's growing every day because as a
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: sale of the investment, and they to be regional, the
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: networks East, West, in Central and so on, so we
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: we incorporate them really fast. So really just a couple
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: of weeks, and we made a software system that it's
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: very easy to integrate with and so no nobody ever
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: said no to us. All of the networks are in
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: and and it will grow hugely. It will be is
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: the biggest network in America today, and we need to
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: do more to communicate that because I noticed people don't
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: know that yet. I didn't know that. I've spent week
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: researching what you guys are doing. That that's a that's
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: a surprising data point that I think would could be
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: a deciding factor for someone who has range anxiety. Even
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: though we know the trips are all local. This is
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: correct and so I'm definitely am going to ampy up
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: this year to communicate that. But one of the reasons
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: I wanted to hold on that is that I need
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: to make sure the quality is there because a risk
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: of if you've got multiple networks, is the qualities not there?
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: So we are remotely monitoring all of the stations and
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: you would think that's enough. For a while, we thought
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: that might be enough, but it's not actually because the
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: terminals are you know, they have payment systems on them
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: and it has to go through quite a few steps
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: before it triggers, and if one of those steps goes wrong,
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: it doesn't allow you to charge. So we found that
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: in some cases this system looks like it's working and doesn't,
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: and so we decided to put out a group of
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: people that they're called the Ford Charge Angels, and they
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: are roaming the network with highly instrumented vehicles. In fact,
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: we had to specially order the instrumentation systems. They're very
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: unique because they monitor all of the signals going between
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: the car and the network, and they are roaming the
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: network with the sole mission to test charges everywhere, especially
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: if there are hot spots, and then when we know
• 51:05
  Speaker 1: there's a problem. They were very connected to the charging networks.
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: We've got the CEOs on speed dial and we even
• 51:13
  Speaker 1: asked them to repair, and if they cannot repair in
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: a time that we deem effective for our customers, we
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: remove them from the network so that so that customers
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: are never sent to a Forting charger, and we can
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: do that really fast. Now we get up to system
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: to do that, and um, the networks are often fix
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: it there, and then if they can't and it's not
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: quick enough, we take it out so that you do
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: not get rooted there. And we're unique in doing that
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: at the moment and the only company doing that. You're
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: coming up on a hundred thousand UM chargers. So if
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: you're looking for an excuse to make a big announcement,
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: I would imagine that number is as as good a
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: reason as any. But but let's talk about charge times.
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: One of the complaints some e V buyers who have
• 52:01
  Speaker 1: been dragging their feet have mentioned has been the long
• 52:05
  Speaker 1: charge times. What's the future of this technology look like?
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: Will we ever get to a point where the seven
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: minute or five minutes fill up that you would get
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: a gasoline you could do with the electricity. What's what's
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: the best we can hope for it? Yeah, So one
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: of the things I'll say is, and this is like
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: when you know you have a flip phone and you're
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: looking at iPhone technology and you think, you know what
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: an iPhone, but until you owned one, you didn't really
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: know what it does. It's like saying, hey, my flip
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: phone lasted four days and my iPhone has to be
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: charged every day. Therefore, I don't want an iPhone. It's
• 52:43
  Speaker 1: like saying that. But when you own an iPhone, you
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: realize you just plug it in a nut and it
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: fits perfectly with your life. If you go on a
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: long trip with an iPhone, you might sometimes charge it
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: with a backup battery or a quick plug in because
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: you know you're going to be using it all day.
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: But nobody nobody went back from an iPhone to a
• 53:04
  Speaker 1: flip phone, and beds are the same. The perception from
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: people is, oh, I need a vehicule that's exactly the
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: same as my gas. This is a massively common misconception.
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: For example, I've owned a Mackie for now a year
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: and a half. I never had a car for more
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: than a year and a half as my company car,
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: and every day it's lug in my home and I
• 53:29
  Speaker 1: leave every day with a full tank. When I go
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: on a business trip, I leave to the airport with
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: a I never ever stop to interrupt my day to
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: fill my car up, not once in a year and
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: a half because it's already always ready. And that's what
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: people forget about this. The thought of having to go
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: and get gas while I'm about to go somewhere and
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: I've forgotten to fill it. It's horrifying to me. Now
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: makes me angry. And then when I go on a
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: longer trip, I type it into the route planner system
• 54:01
  Speaker 1: and it tells me where to stop and win, and
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: I drive for three hours and then I stop, I
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: plug it in and walk away. It takes me precisely
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: ten seconds to charge my car. I plug it and
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: I go and do something else. I go and get
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: a coffee, or I go shopping. There's many of the
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: sites have shops next door. Or I put out my
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: laptop and catch up with mail. By the time I
• 54:22
  Speaker 1: look back up again, I realized I've overstayed it and
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: my car is now fully charged. Most of the time,
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: to be honest, or I talked to somebody who's come
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: to talk about the car. That happens a lot as well.
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: But really, you know, it's a different way of thinking
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: about it. It takes me dirty seconds to charge my
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: car because I plug it in and I'm doing something
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: else and most owners of modern webs will feel the
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: same about it, you know. So, so I wanted to
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: say that first because that changes your life and your
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: way you think about these products now. Later it takes
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: on a typical trip, the car will usually take about
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: twenty few minutes to charge because it usually hops you
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: between fast chargers, and it will favor the fastest charges.
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: And on most trips you'll stop and you're trying to
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: get to a destination, so it will boost you quickly
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: at the beginning part of the charge faster than the
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: later part. So it will tend to optimize you by
• 55:20
  Speaker 1: charging maybe twenty minutes or twenty two minutes or something
• 55:23
  Speaker 1: that's just a long enough to go and get a sandwich,
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: restroom and back to the car really and they're off again.
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: So that's what it tends to do. Now, do we
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: have technology later that will charge even faster, Yes, we do,
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: like eight hundred volt systems, so they will charge even faster,
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: under twenty minutes for the entire charge from you tend
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: to Yes, these are coming as well, But honestly, it
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: makes less difference to your trip than you think it does.
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: So instead of twenty two minutes, you're there for ten. Okay,
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: But as I say, you plugging them go and do
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: something else mostly so they will get better. But but
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: cars are ready now, you've seem common misconception. We don't
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: need to wait with three hundred mile cars, and we're
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: up to three three now with that plus the network
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: that's out that we're ready immediately. Especially you mean a
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: lot of customers are using it as their second car.
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: It's a complete no brainer. So it's just we have
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: to do more to communicate that to customers and bring
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: customers along with us. Three hundred miles means that if
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: you're driving sixty to seventy, which is what the highways
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: by me are, that that's four or five six hours
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: of driving. You still need to get out, stretch your legs,
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: go to the bathroom occasionally, if that's right. And most
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: people won't go below temper cent. You know, they're a
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: bit nervous, so they don't usually go below So you
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: have to save that thirty so it's like two seventy miles.
• 56:49
  Speaker 1: But you're right, if you're going faster, it will be
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: a little bit les but it's quite a long time
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: and most people need to stop and rest and and
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: then you just build it into your day. Like I
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: say you when I'm on going someone for a business trip,
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: I stopped halfway plugging in, get a coffee, and I
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: catch up on some mail and so usually, but I
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: get into it, I look up and oaks, I've stayed longer,
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: and now I'm really fully charged. I didn't just boost it.
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: I charged right the way back up to now and
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: off I go again, and I arrived with too much range,
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: and then plugging at the hotel. It's ready the next day.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: So it just fixed into your life more than you
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: think it does. And the from fifty over three hundred
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: miles go very robustly over three miles, so even better.
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: So so the folks who are sharping for five hundred
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: mile range or even talking about eight hundred and a
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: thousand mile range, that seems based on what you're saying,
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: that really seems like it's unnecessary and not practical because
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: the human element, even with driver assist, the human element
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: is still going to get fatigued and still needs to
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: occasionally stretch their lets. So you know, they are use
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: cases for those vehicles, and only one really does that
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: kind of range at the moment, and so that's some
• 58:07
  Speaker 1: customers need that, So that's okay. But but you are
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: carrying it's not like gas. You are carrying extra weight
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: with you and every day that is costing you money
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: and it is changing the performance of the car and
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: it has all that weight for handling. So carrying a
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: five dred mile battery when you really do thirty miles
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: a day is a real waste. UM. So you know
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: there's an optimum, I would say, and for some use
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: cases you know that's okay, but it's it's a rare
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: use case. Um. And so we're seeing once you reach
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: three hundred, it really changes the impression of the customers.
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: They've become much more confident around the just over three.
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: So last battery question, UM. One of the issues I've
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: read about is the question of either recycling or reusability
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: of EV batteries. Are either of those anywhere off on
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: the horizon? Oh yes, So that's super important to us, um,
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: And for two reasons. It's becoming clear that the supply
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: of batteries and all of the chemicals needed are a
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: real challenge. And as the whole world ramps up to
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: electric vehicles, it will split into those that are able
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: to get the materials and batteries and those that are
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: not and if somebody hasn't started already and it's very
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: far advanced into that, they're going to have a huge problem.
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: And so that's why you've seen that we invested over
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: eleven billion dollars in Blue Oval City, the largest that
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: I know of investment of its kind in America. And
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: it builds an entire city to build trucks and then
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: and also two plants so far for batteries, a huge
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: amount of batteries. And it also vertically integrates the chemicals
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: supply required for the batteries. Um So that's the first stage.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: So because we know that we need to secure enough
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: batteries for millions of cars, where is that plant to
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: build those batteries? Located? Tennessee? Tennessee? Because am I remembering
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: this correctly? The marquee was made I think in Canada
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: or Mexico, I don't remember which it's it's Mexico, yes,
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 1: because that was the next plant that we had available.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: Um So that's why we went there. You know, we're
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: gonna be using lots of our plants and and and
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: and and we will fill them up as we go.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: So we kind of fill them up with whichever plant
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: is ready and some other factors. Actually, that's why that
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: one was Mexico and the from fifty in Dearborn, UM.
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 1: And so I will you start filling up all our
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: gas plants one at a time. So the Blue Level
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: City Complex is six miles square in West Tennessee, UM
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: and the battery part correction is Central Kentucky with twin
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: battery plants. So yeah, it's it's huge, a better but
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: a really exciting one. And the one you asked me
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 1: is about recycling. So we tied with Redwood Materials. J. B.
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: Strobell was one of the founders of Tesla and he
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: now runs a company called Redwood Materials. They're very high
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: ambitions in recycling and we are partnered with them. And
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: so we are beginning now using um scrap from battery
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: production to recycle it to produce materials for new battery production.
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: And as the batteries start coming back, we're going to
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: start using them to extract materials and reuse them back
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: into our supply plan. It does two things. One, it
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: secures battery supply when some of these chemicals and materials
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: could become scarce, and it also allows us to reduce
• 1:02:14
  Speaker 1: the price, and we have some quite ambitious price targets
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: for that recycled material and I mean the commodity. So
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 1: they move up and down every day. You know, in
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: some cases it looks very good value compared to buying
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 1: on the open market, and your market forces will determine
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: the price of those chemicals. So we're one of the
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: biggest operations that I know of to do that, and
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: they will be on site in Blue Oval City from
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: the start, really quite fascinating. Let's talk a little bit
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: about some of the things that we're looking at in
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: the future. You mentioned how proud you are of the
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: price points that you've introduced cars like the Marquee or
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: the Transit or the Lightning. Um, what do you think
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: is going to happen going forward in terms of pricing,
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: I not a not a battery hybrid, but a regenerative
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: I guess p h t V hybrid. The Maverick was
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: priced at pretty in expense of two hours for a
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: compact four door pickup truck. How cheap can battery evs
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 1: get in the future? Well today, So the FRO fifty
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: Lightning with the included incentive that's available is really in
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: the range right now of gas from right in the
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: heartland of where we sell most of them. So I
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: could argue that today we have one of the first
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: vehicles that has reached parity with an equivalent truck. And
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 1: I say equivalent. Yet the electrics faster than any from
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: fifty we ever made more talk than any from fifty
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 1: we ever made quite handles better, etcetera, etcetera than any
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: f fifty ever. And it starts at the price of
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: the gas. So there's one segment where we've managed to
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: achieve it. That one is with the incentive, So that's
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: helped us, helps it bring to bring it to more people.
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: We are working on other vehicles not announced yet to
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: bring the vehicles to more people, a lower cost vehicle.
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: I can't say anything more about it at the moment,
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: but that's one of our missions. And part of this
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: huge investments we're making in batteries is obviously supporting that,
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: because the biggest component by far is the battery. And
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: already I can say that Mattie is a similar cost
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: to run over five years as a Ford Escape. The
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: total cost spent, it's the same as a foud Escape already,
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: so that is also supported by an incentive at the moment,
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: but that's amazing for those that wake up to see
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: that now they're getting a huge bargain. And the charging
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: networks already reached nine plugs, so they're available everywhere and
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: there's hardly anyone there yet, so you also have the
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: network to yourself, so it's a V ownership at the
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: moment is just fantastic. You'll also find the parking spot
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 1: for many places right next to the entrance because that's
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: where the electric spot is, and they're half empty as well,
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 1: so when you drive there, you feel like a V
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: I P. So it's a really good time to get
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 1: into them now. But we will. You know, we do
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: have plans to bring vehicles that are even lower cost
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: um and we're moving to more segments. So the three
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: rows are next one along where the real family car
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: size that is so popular in America. So currently the
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: Ford Explorer, which I think comes with a third row,
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: is available hybrid. You mentioned you're looking to do a
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 1: three row suv. Can we assume we're going to see
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 1: an E Explorer sometime soon, So yeah, we've announced that
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: we're working on that one. It's it's a three row
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: and the Explorer is indeed three row, so we're working
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: on that now, but I would say it's the same
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 1: segment as a three row explorer, I wouldn't call it
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: any explorer. We intend to reinvent what these vehicles can be.
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: And again, it will not be an explorer of an
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: electric motor in it. It will be a new a
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: vehicle that offers new experiences that are as game changing
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: as bidirectional power and megapower funkies for the front fifty,
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: but something things that are designed to delight the customers
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: in this segment, the things they want in their daily lives.
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: I won't say more about it yet, but intends to
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: be an incredible vehicle. Again, so previously you said evy
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 1: adoption is similar to the process that the iPhone had
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: to go through. Any any groundbreaking product requires a readjustment
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: into your life. Is that what you're seeing with ev adoption.
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: Once people make it part of their routine, it's no
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 1: longer the electric car. It just becomes the car. Oh yes,
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: I mean universally, when people make the switch, no one
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: goes back. It's the only analogy. And when I try
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: to get across to people to use is the whole
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 1: moving to iPhone or smartphone from footphone, no one goes back.
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 1: And before people moved, they didn't know that. They thought
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: they understood what an iPhone was, and because it looks
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: similar to similar to a phone, but they don't didn't
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: realize what it really is. And once they owned it,
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: then they suddenly switched. They will never go back, and
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: they told everyone they know is exactly the same. The
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: most misleading thing about evs is they look like a car,
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: and therefore you think it's like the cars you've known
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: all your life, and it's nothing like that. So the
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: more people we can get in there to feel it,
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: the more people it will convert quickly. So let's talk
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: about that. You know a lot of people a few
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: years ago, we're projecting five. It doesn't feel like it's
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: going to take that long. Where do you think the
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: EV market is as percentage of new vehicle sales in
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: or or Yeah, So if you think every person who
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: gets one, we'll never go back, that's pretty much the rule.
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: Then you start thinking about how fast is that going
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 1: to take? Now, it took ten years for the iPhone
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: to get everywhere right now or similar phones right so
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: it took time for that because people take time, and
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 1: so projections we changed weekly because we're trying to keep
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 1: ahead of it. We we intend to be push ahead
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: of the market UM and we're saying, you know, globally,
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: half of our production it's going to be UM electric
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: and that's millions of the year. When when do you
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 1: think the last internal combustion engine car new that is
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: manufactured in the US? Susion possible to tell. There's there's
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 1: some use cases that are particularly difficult to solve. For battery,
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 1: I actually think it will run for long a long time,
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 1: but they will be they won't. There will be you know,
• 1:09:25
  Speaker 1: for specific reasons or for price. That's that's why they
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 1: will keep going. The best products will be electric. It's like,
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: I mean, even if you look at tools. I recently
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: bought a Listiam iron leafblower, and the first generation were
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: a little bit less powerful than gas and much more expensive. Well,
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: this next generation I had a choice same as gas
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: and just a little bit more expensive or much more
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: powerful than gas and more expensive. And that happen to
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: just a couple of years. By the way, it's much
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: quite a much more controllable and I'm never going back
• 1:10:06
  Speaker 1: to a gas one. But there are use cases for gas.
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: Belief lift blow is still in certain cases, right, So
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 1: I think gas will run for a long time. It
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: will be increasingly regulated for emissions, and it will get
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 1: more and more expensive to regulate for emissions. It will
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: be less and necessarieson to to need it. But I
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: believe there'll be a reason for a while. So it
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: was impossible to predict at the moment. So so let's
• 1:10:31
  Speaker 1: talk about interior design in electrics. UM, I think Tesla
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: gets the credit or the blame for just removing just
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: about every manual mechanical button and putting it on the screen.
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: I personally have found that to be frustrating if especially
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: when I'm driving and it's three nested, three levels in
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: and I have to take my off the road because
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: I just want to lower the fan or increase the heat.
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: What sorts of buttons should stay? UM, A mechanical button,
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: like if I want to put my seat heat or on,
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: why do I have to dig my way through three
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: or four menus and and go down just the just
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: the air conditioning heating system? Can we please keep that
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 1: as mechanical buttons? So here's the way we think about it.
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 1: So how many buttons on the front of your iPhone. None.
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 1: Would you like me to put some buttons on the
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 1: front of your icephone? Actually? Yeah, I have the on
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: the side, I have the volume and the on off,
• 1:11:40
  Speaker 1: which which but the it's the things that I use
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: every time I get into the car. I don't want
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: to go digging for And by the way, half my
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: cars have too many buttons I have. You know, there
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: are vehicles that have. You know, it looks like it's
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: a fighter jet. I don't need that either. I like
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: the idea of the the screen, but you know, the
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: heat the seat warmers are a perfect example. And one
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 1: of the things I thought was so interesting about the
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: Marquee was the volume button was a physical button at
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: the bottom of the screen and when you turn the
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 1: screen on it I believe the same set of have
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 1: to touch buttons are at the bottom of the screen
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: always am I am? I remembering that correctly? You are
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 1: so so. The philosophy is this This the reason why
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: I ask you that question. The philosophy is, um, you
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: do you want to do better than buttons? Okay, that's
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 1: the philosophy, and the ones that you need, when you
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: need them should be first surfeits. The whole point is
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: that you do not have to dig and you have
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: access to it when you need it, and that's the
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 1: skill and getting that just right. There are some things
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 1: you need buttons for or or control sticks, like the indicator.
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: I imagine we're going to have the control stick for
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: a long time because you use it all the time
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 1: and it works really well, so don't take that away.
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 1: And certain other things like the button to get out
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: of the car, you really need that. But other buttons
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 1: can be better when we can move them or change
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: them to context. So for example, you mentioned I want
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: heated seat immediately, so yes, we keep the heated seat
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: on first surface at all times on the matching um.
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: And you want access to the heating controls absolutely and
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: temperature and so on. So we and we launched the
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 1: car with a set of buttons are pervasive. If they're
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: always there, then our customers gave us feedback and they
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: want an extra button or one taken away, or they
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 1: want the hood released to appear when they stop. Now,
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: with an electronic screen, you can change it, and we're
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: about to change it over the air. Actually, we're going
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 1: to do a big human machine interface refreshed this year,
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: and we're going to listen to the feedback from customers
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: and make it better. And that's the great thing about
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: a digital screen. You can make it better where a
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: physical button is there and you can't. I give you
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 1: an example, a button for the cameras on our vehicle.
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: People say, I've gotta have the button on a truck.
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: I'm always using the camera. So I say, well, at
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: the moment, you have to press the button once for
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: the front, to press it again for the rear, press
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 1: it again for another view, and you press it so
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: many times and you get it wrong and you cycle
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: back around again instead, as soon as that sensor sense
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: is something nearby, when you're at low speed parking automatically
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 1: brings up the cameras and then it presents you with
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 1: the direct camera button for the feed that you want,
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 1: and then it remembers the one you use most. So
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: now you pull up to the parking space, it automatically
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: brings up your favorite camera. You don't touch anything. If
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: you don't like it and you want a different view today,
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: you just one touch a new view instead of pressing
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: the same button four times. So that's you know, another
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: example of you think you want the button until you
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: have a system that works better. Now we understand you
• 1:15:06
  Speaker 1: can't always guess perfect, so you always give the customer
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: the controls, but you bring them at the right time.
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: You don't need the camera button when you're at sixty.
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: So that's the design and we never get it with
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 1: perfect first, so we have over the air update and
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: we keep improving it um And that that control of
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 1: you mentioned is that's an amazing piece of technology. Is
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 1: brand new. It's molecularly bonded to the screen, first in industry,
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: and that's actually it's actually like an input device. It's
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: not it's not just a volume knob, and we're going
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 1: to unlock that in the next in the software update
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: later this year. It's gonna so that it can control
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 1: lots of things because it's very pleasing when you turn it,
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: it feels good, and its control volume, but we can
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: also make a control temperature, heat and other things, and
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 1: we can use it for gaming as well. So we're
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 1: about to unlock that button. It was always planned. We
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 1: couldn't get there for job one, but but now we
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: have customer inputs that we're going to make it better.
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: So I have two other questions. I have two or
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: three other questions I have to ask you before we
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 1: get onto our favorite questions. The first you hinted at
• 1:16:13
  Speaker 1: earlier I was reading you're prowling on social media looking
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: for people complaining about their products and helping them resolve
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 1: whatever issues they have. You personally called them to tell
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: us about about what you've why you do that, and
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 1: what you've learned from that. Yeahs as part of the
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 1: launch of the vehicle and watching startups, and we learned
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: how they watch social media because these are exciting product products,
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: so people talk about them all the time. So there's
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 1: a there are forums like the Macke Forum for from
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: Macke obviously, and it's a rich source of direct customer feedback.
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: The customers are taking video, photographs, big descriptions about what
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 1: they see, both positive and negative, and it's the richest
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 1: source of input I've ever had. So I watch it
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: every morning. My whole team watch it every morning. My
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: wife sick of me watching videos every minute I get
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 1: because the customers are telling you directly what they say,
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 1: you can't buy that, and then we use that to
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: develop the cars. So that's why I watch that. Then
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: I see customers struggling with things we've already fixed. And
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 1: at first the buyers of the premium Maggie, they were
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 1: really bad people. They really did their research. They either
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 1: are experienced before or they've done a lot of research,
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: and so they all help each other. You watch them
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 1: struggling and they help each other, and they they've learned it,
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 1: there's no problem. But when we went with the GT,
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: I'm noticing more customers are having basic problems because they
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 1: haven't learned the basics of ev They just loved the
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 1: car so much that they bought one. So those customers,
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: I'm seeing that, and I call them because I want
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 1: to hear from them what they're experiencing. And every time
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 1: I never hear what I think I'm going to I
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 1: think I know, I speak to them, it is almost
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: never exactly the same. So I do that a couple
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 1: of times a week. I asked the permission. Of course,
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 1: they love that. There hasn't been one that haven't ended
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 1: up with an hour on the phone with them hearing
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: about their experiences, and you know, their family and how
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 1: they're using the car and so on, and that the
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 1: richest source of input. And then I work out how
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 1: might I help people like them. And for example, with
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: the newer cars, they don't know the basics of EV.
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 1: They don't know the evs dropped range in the cold.
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 1: They don't know how much power that their heater can use,
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 1: especially if they left it outside and the whole batteries
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 1: at minus tend degrees C. They don't know to preheat.
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 1: They don't know that the car will heat its battery
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 1: when it's plugged in. It will make sure the battery
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: is kept MP to them. They don't know that. And finally,
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 1: they don't know how to reset their driver history, which
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 1: the car has learned their behaviors over a week, and
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 1: we'll give you an accurate range. It's very accurate. But
• 1:19:08
  Speaker 1: if the customers not been looking after the car as
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 1: a BEVE owner, then their range is going to drop
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 1: a lot, and they can instantly reset it back and
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 1: then change their behavior and they will see the results
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 1: and means immediately. So they don't know any of those things,
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 1: and they show them that they're usually super delighted, and
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: then they've learned how to control their car. They've changed,
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 1: you know, the temperature of a couple of degrees. They
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 1: use the heated seat and stereo wheel and they preheat
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 1: the car, their range goes from a massive loss to
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 1: like five loss and then they write to me afterwards
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 1: and they're just absolutely delighted. So and now I go
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 1: back to my team and saying, how are we going
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 1: to show customers. We have put it in the instructions,
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 1: we have put it on the app, we have sent
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 1: them messages, and we do tell them to plug the
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 1: car in if the temperatures cold every time they exit
• 1:19:55
  Speaker 1: the car when it's cold, but they don't know why
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 1: they're going to do it. So some customers just ignore
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 1: all of that until we speak to them. So we're
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 1: trying to think of how to help them, and we're
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: trying everything. It's basically psychology. So I'm thinking of all
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: different methods and we brainstorming how will we do it?
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 1: And different customers, each one is different and have their
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 1: own ways. But you know, one way I'm considering at
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: the moment it is a kind of competitive way where
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 1: we say to you, hey, did you know you're in
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: the bottom third of range for this car? And that
• 1:20:27
  Speaker 1: will make the customers say, hey, why am I in
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 1: the bottom dead And then we'll explain to them and
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 1: now they're listening because you're bringing a little a little
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 1: peloton gamification to managing range. That's right to to get
• 1:20:42
  Speaker 1: their attention so that they care. I mean many customers
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 1: know already, but a lot don't. And as we go
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 1: mainstream there will be more of those. So it's really
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 1: fun to do it. But that's why I call customers.
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 1: It's great fun. Anyway. I love I love talking to
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 1: them and here and feedback really interesting. I know you
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: do a lot of traveling. You you previously discussed an
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: interesting scenario and Shanghai about how families see within a
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: vehicle and how different it is from the US. Can
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: you explain that and tell us about some other differences
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 1: you see in customers around the world. How did different
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 1: users user vehicles differently? Oh? Yes, so we're all humans
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 1: with similar needs, but due to cultural changes, we behave differently.
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 1: So we were developing a global vehicle and China is
• 1:21:37
  Speaker 1: one of the leaders in electric vehicle development, so we
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 1: spent a long time there. Actually, I think I was
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 1: sixteen weeks in China in total that year. And we
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 1: did human centric development, which means you don't ask them
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: what they want, you watch them with their permission, of course,
• 1:21:53
  Speaker 1: and and watch them with their families, and we had
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 1: people to translate for us, not just the language, but
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: the what's going on. And frankly, if I've been watching
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 1: them without those people, I would have missed it, and
• 1:22:05
  Speaker 1: they would We watched them in the car and where
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 1: they sit, and then we'd ask some questions and then
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: the person the person would say, did you see that?
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: I said, we'll see what? So did you see how?
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 1: The question was asked of the uh man, and before
• 1:22:22
  Speaker 1: he answered, he looked at the grandmother. No, I didn't
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 1: see that, said yet, what do you know what that is?
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: And I don't know what it is. That's because it's
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 1: typical in Chinese culture. The grandmother will be buying that
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 1: first car for the family, and so and the and
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 1: the grandmother also will take will bow to the child.
• 1:22:42
  Speaker 1: The child will be in the second row, and so
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 1: the grandmother will be even next to the child or
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: in the third row, because the mother will be in
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: the second row looking after the child. So the third
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 1: row of the car is super important because the grandmother
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: is buying the car. My god, we never would have
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 1: known that, and we did not give the attention to
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 1: the third row the same as the first row that
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 1: would not have been our plan. And so things like
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 1: that you can only get by watching people and learning.
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: And even if you ask a Chinese person what's different
• 1:23:16
  Speaker 1: about here, no one can answer what's different between me
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 1: and everybody else because they don't know what to say.
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 1: You have to watch them and say, oh, look look
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 1: that's different to what we know. So that's that's that's
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 1: one there. That's one observation of many, many, many, but
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: that that taught us a lot. And when they're evaluating
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: to buy that car, the grandmother will get will will
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 1: come with them, will sit in that third row, and
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 1: we'll give them their opinion on the car. And and
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 1: the buyer is going to pay attention to that grandmother
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: just because of cultural and also the fact they're buying
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 1: the car. So there's one um. Others in i'd say Europe,
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 1: many more people don't have gary a garage, so they
• 1:24:01
  Speaker 1: can't put a charger in, and so they're very interested
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 1: in how they're going to own an electric car having
• 1:24:06
  Speaker 1: to go and charge it, and that does require some
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 1: change to your life, and you can build that into
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 1: your life, but you do have to consider it. So
• 1:24:14
  Speaker 1: they have different priorities for charging speed and where there's
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: charges available to them and so on. So we're having
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 1: to make sure we make vehicles that suit their life.
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 1: They typically want the eight vehicles that charge faster because
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 1: they're going to have to go and sit there every week.
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 1: And I also asked another customers about how they live
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 1: with their cars. And then one guy I asked him,
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 1: I said, hey, would you want us to change that
• 1:24:41
  Speaker 1: charging speed to fifteen minutes? He said no, way said
• 1:24:45
  Speaker 1: that surprises me. He said, that's the best forty minutes
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 1: of my week. I go out, I sit there and
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 1: read a book and charge the CARSA Okay, I don't
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 1: expected that. As I say, the customers don't say what
• 1:24:56
  Speaker 1: you expect when you asked them. Huh. Quite quite a interesting.
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna throw you one curveball question before we get
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 1: to our favorites, and that is I have to assume
• 1:25:06
  Speaker 1: you saw the film Forward versus Ferrari. What were your
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 1: thoughts on that story? And you grew up in London?
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 1: Were you a fan of Ken Miles? Yeah, that's a
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 1: good one. So, I mean, we love that story. We
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 1: we we all went as a team to watch that,
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 1: to watch the you know, the struggle. I mean and
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 1: it's all about, you know, people feeling you can't do
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 1: something and then overcoming it. You know, that's what you know,
• 1:25:31
  Speaker 1: of course it's all about. And it's a corporate forward there.
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: You know. It's fun to watch. It's done in a
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 1: really cool way, but really it's also about cars and
• 1:25:40
  Speaker 1: about pushing yourself to win and when you didn't expect it.
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 1: We all love that. We felt a little bit. You know,
• 1:25:47
  Speaker 1: no one expected us to win with an electric car.
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 1: Where when we said we were introducing electric car, I
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 1: think it's fair to say most of the world did
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 1: not expect us to to be the number one recommended
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 1: car this year of consumer reports, in our first generation.
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 1: I mean, I've got to say that's kind of a
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 1: stretch even for us. We expected to do well, but
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: that is beyond what we What we achieved was really
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 1: respect what has gone before us. So we saw the
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: um alignment of that film with some of the work
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 1: we were doing. And Ken Miles was a super unique
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 1: individual in this He's got his flaws, like all heroes,
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 1: they've got their flaws. So we we love that. We
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 1: all went to watch it together. We've we've watched it
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 1: many times. Really interesting, well I know only have you
• 1:26:31
  Speaker 1: for a few more minutes, So let me jump to
• 1:26:34
  Speaker 1: my favorite questions that we ask all of our guests,
• 1:26:37
  Speaker 1: starting with what have you been streaming these days? Have
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 1: you had a whole lot of time to watch anything
• 1:26:43
  Speaker 1: on um, Netflix or Amazon or anything like that. So
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 1: I've got twin twin boys as well, ten year old,
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 1: So it's work and family, that's it. And but when
• 1:26:56
  Speaker 1: I listened every week, I listened to the Inside EVS podcasts,
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 1: Tom Malogny and Dominic and Kyle. They are super geek
• 1:27:04
  Speaker 1: about electric and I find it fascinating. Every week I
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 1: met met them and we've we've been through some of
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 1: the cars together. Taking Tom in the from fifty for
• 1:27:14
  Speaker 1: the first time was amazing. He's super experienced with EVS
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 1: and he was still amazed by the product, so he
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: was the journalist referred to. It was so cool to
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 1: see him so excited about it. He's ordered one one
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 1: of the first people to get it. So I love
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 1: that podcast because it's so detailed and if you hold
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 1: you so much, and they care so much about getting
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 1: it right. They've worked with EVS for fifteen years or more,
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 1: so that's what that's one of the first things I
• 1:27:38
  Speaker 1: listened to when when I've got time, are you I
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 1: do what I'm doing? Other task I listened to every week.
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 1: H really interesting. Tell us about your mentors who helped
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: shape your career. Yeah, so, UM, I always loved Virgin
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 1: and what they did there external, let's say, because they're
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 1: totally focused on the customer. As I went through my career,
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: that's the thing that I grew to do. That's my
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 1: trade market. I love just making amazing stuff that they love.
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 1: So he is obsessed by customer and and so that
• 1:28:13
  Speaker 1: that's one of the things I He was an inspiration
• 1:28:16
  Speaker 1: and it still is now. And I saw how that
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 1: worked out. You know, you look after the customer and
• 1:28:21
  Speaker 1: everything else will look after itself. UM. I had earlier
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 1: mentors in engineering who was superb engineers. UM and one guy,
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 1: guy called Franz lemon Um. He was retiring and in Germany.
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 1: I worked in Germany for ten years. And when he
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 1: went to do his um retirement do they had to
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 1: move it and we didn't know why he and they
• 1:28:46
  Speaker 1: moved it to the showroom and he turned up to
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 1: the showroom. There were three thousand people there. Wow, everybody
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 1: from the site had turned up. It was unbelievable. It
• 1:28:57
  Speaker 1: had a very moving speech on stage. And and I
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 1: have formed a habit of interviewing those who were retiring.
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 1: I asked them, and always not in one ever said no.
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 1: And I sat down with him and I said, could
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 1: you give me one piece of advice? Because the guy
• 1:29:13
  Speaker 1: had been so effective, so loved, I've done so much,
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 1: because you know, could you tell me one thing that
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 1: you that we would pass on? And he said, yep,
• 1:29:23
  Speaker 1: straight away. And he said, at the beginning of my career,
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 1: I I would focus on the most academic, the most brilliant,
• 1:29:31
  Speaker 1: and this is how I would choose people. But by
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 1: the end of my career, I also I saw a
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 1: different pause. I saw a person who wanted to do
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 1: it so bad, don't do anything. They'd learn everything they
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 1: needed to about it. And all of our employees are
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 1: very educated. You know, we're lucky. We educate from great institutions,
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 1: so they're all they're all clever. But the one when
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 1: somebody really wants it, that head to do anything to
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 1: work to get it. He said, those people always do
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: well because they want it so bad. And he said,
• 1:30:07
  Speaker 1: that's how I recruited people from then on and I
• 1:30:10
  Speaker 1: never forgot that. When I'm interviewing now, if someone's not
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 1: perfect background, that doesn't matter. If they've got they've learned
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 1: about the subject and they want it badly, I will
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 1: give that person a chance. And it's never worked out
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 1: wrong since. So that was an early mentor maybe ten
• 1:30:28
  Speaker 1: years ago, but I never forgot that. So that's that's
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 1: how I feel my teams up now. Really interesting, let's
• 1:30:34
  Speaker 1: talk about books. What are some of your favorites and
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 1: what are you reading right now? Yeah, So A Team
• 1:30:40
  Speaker 1: of Teams um by General Stanley McCrystal and David Silverman
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 1: amazing is using the story of the teams in Afghanistan
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 1: and what they faced and how to uh and then
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: it's relation to business and it's really about instead of
• 1:31:00
  Speaker 1: one person at the top telling everyone what to do
• 1:31:02
  Speaker 1: and they all have to come to them and they're
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 1: a bottleneck. Instead, you make teams of teams. Each of
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 1: your teams, you make sure you're aligned on what you're
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: trying to do, and then you give them the space
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 1: to operate and you trust them and either can be
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 1: much more effective that way, and that's what they found
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 1: in Afghanistan. Each team was independent and could could operate
• 1:31:25
  Speaker 1: even without communication back to the central Amazing. So that's one.
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: Another one's called Nudge Cass Sunsteine and Richard Tyler, just
• 1:31:34
  Speaker 1: amazing about how um a lot of companies in society
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 1: nudge you every day and you have no idea how
• 1:31:43
  Speaker 1: much you're being nudged. It's but it's super important. And
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 1: when you're developing cars and products, if you nudge someone
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 1: where the right button is, they'll press the button. If
• 1:31:54
  Speaker 1: you don't, they you know, they can't work out with
• 1:31:56
  Speaker 1: the buttons, so they use it in supermarkets and all
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 1: the things you might imagine. It's fascinating book. I really,
• 1:32:03
  Speaker 1: I really recommend that that you your listeners read that one.
• 1:32:07
  Speaker 1: It's just a wonderful book. Quite interesting. And our final
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: two questions, what sort of advice would you give to
• 1:32:14
  Speaker 1: a recent college grad who was interested in a career
• 1:32:18
  Speaker 1: in either automotive design and manufacturing or battery and electronic technology.
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 1: So I would say, you do your research and look
• 1:32:30
  Speaker 1: at what customers are saying and and and think about
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 1: what you would like to do as part of that,
• 1:32:38
  Speaker 1: and then and build your knowledge up. First, show your
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 1: interest in it, and then approach some companies who you
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 1: feel moving in that space. Who you think maybe leading
• 1:32:52
  Speaker 1: on winning in that space. And once upon a time
• 1:32:55
  Speaker 1: that was really Silicon Valley and here you see that
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 1: was really moving. But I believe now you know, you're
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 1: seeing automotive companies of showing their moving into technology and
• 1:33:08
  Speaker 1: extremely interesting technology and with a battery electric vehicle future
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: and autonomous I think it's one of the most exciting sectors.
• 1:33:16
  Speaker 1: And if you come to these you can make a difference. Here,
• 1:33:19
  Speaker 1: you're not just a number you you will have You'll
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 1: be able to train and make a real difference in
• 1:33:24
  Speaker 1: products that are the second most expensive thing that people
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 1: buy in their lives. And I think I think I
• 1:33:30
  Speaker 1: would say there was a time when people said, hey,
• 1:33:33
  Speaker 1: all cars are going to be similar soon and there
• 1:33:35
  Speaker 1: will be a commodity and that may be very sad.
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 1: And I think we've seen the first round of battery
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 1: electric peoples couldn't be more wrong. There's nothing like that.
• 1:33:44
  Speaker 1: They're just like gas in the fact that there's a
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 1: whole suite of products with different attributes and feel to them,
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 1: and there's a new level of performance that we could
• 1:33:54
  Speaker 1: never do with gas as well, So it's even more
• 1:33:55
  Speaker 1: exciting than ever before. So I think this sector is
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 1: extremely important. Look for some of the companies that you
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 1: admire in that space. I don't forget about the O E.
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 1: M automotive companies because I think there's nowhere I would
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 1: rather be than in this company doing this. This is
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 1: even more exciting than the startups to me, because we're
• 1:34:14
  Speaker 1: going to change the world with this. So fascinating and
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 1: our final question, what do you know about the world
• 1:34:21
  Speaker 1: of technology automobile manufacturing design today that you wish you
• 1:34:27
  Speaker 1: knew twenty five years ago or so when you were
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: first getting started for Wow? Yeah, so, I mean it
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 1: took it took me years of working as an engineer
• 1:34:37
  Speaker 1: in my little world, taking targets from whoever gave you,
• 1:34:41
  Speaker 1: gave them from above and working in my closed area
• 1:34:45
  Speaker 1: with goggles on. Right, that that's how I worked for
• 1:34:48
  Speaker 1: many many years. I didn't I wasn't looking up to
• 1:34:52
  Speaker 1: where my contribution played into the full vehicle. They didn't
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 1: really encourage that either, And I wish I had said
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: told on them and it was my doing and why
• 1:35:01
  Speaker 1: and is that world class? And how can we push
• 1:35:03
  Speaker 1: the boundaries? If I'd done that earlier, it would have
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 1: been even more exciting. So it's just you tend to
• 1:35:08
  Speaker 1: get into a job, especially in I guess the big
• 1:35:12
  Speaker 1: o ems you're a small cog in a big system.
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 1: I wish I'd looked up earlier to where does a
• 1:35:18
  Speaker 1: small cog fit in and why? And I'm encouraging everyone
• 1:35:21
  Speaker 1: in our company to do that now, and certainly everybody
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 1: in Moodily is going to be doing that. So that's
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 1: why I wish I knew thirty years ago. I wish
• 1:35:28
  Speaker 1: I had kept that wide of you. While I'm it's
• 1:35:31
  Speaker 1: important to get into details and work on details, very important,
• 1:35:35
  Speaker 1: but you also must keep that overview of where does
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 1: this sitting and fitting and why? Huh? Really quite fascinating, Darren,
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 1: Thank you for being so generous with your time. We
• 1:35:46
  Speaker 1: have been speaking to Darren Palmer. He is the general
• 1:35:49
  Speaker 1: manager of Battery Electric Vehicles at Ford. If you enjoy
• 1:35:53
  Speaker 1: this conversation, we'll be sure to check out any of
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 1: our previous podcast that we've done over the past eight
• 1:36:00
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• 1:36:04
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• 1:36:08
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• 1:36:11
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• 1:36:15
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• 1:36:18
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• 1:36:21
  Speaker 1: if I did not thank the Crack team that helped
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 1: put these conversations together each week. Mohammed Remaui is my
• 1:36:28
  Speaker 1: audio engineer. Sean Russo is my researcher. Paris Wald is
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 1: my producer Atka val Bron is our project manager. I'm
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 1: Barry Rihlts. You've been listening to Masters in Business on
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 1: Bloomberg Radio.