Ford of Europe will consolidate passenger car production from four platforms to two to reduce manufacturing costs.
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According to Automotive News Europe, the next generation of upper-medium vehicles – including the Mondeo, Galaxy minivan and a crossover vehicle to compete with the Toyota RAV4 – will be built on a longer-wheelbase version of Ford’s C1 lower-medium platform. The extended platform is code-named EUCD.
The basic C1 platform introduced in 2003 already is the basis for the new lower-medium Ford Focus, Focus C-Max, Mazda3, Mazda5 and Volvo S40 and V50.
All small cars, from the Ford Fusion and Fiesta down to the Ka and possibly even lower, will be developed on Ford’s B platform, known as B2E. Mazda is leading the work on that programme.
Ford hopes to reduce manufacturing and development costs on its European line-up by simplifying the basic underpinnings of its cars and making them more flexible to support more niche vehicles. Ford officials refer not to platforms but architectures, which at Ford consist of a “store” of components and systems the brands can choose from.
The EUCD plan has ramifications for Ford’s other brands, including Jaguar, whose X-type shares many of its components with the current Ford Mondeo.
Sources say the next generation X-type could be built on the extended C1 platform.
“There are not many platforms that are that flexible,” said Nigel Griffiths, analyst for Global Insight in London. “If they crack it, it will become a sort of benchmark for other manufacturers to follow, I suspect.”
Griffiths estimated Ford could save “hundreds of millions” by not having a separate upper-medium platform.
Currently, PSA is Europe’s leanest car maker in terms of platforms. The French group has nearly completed its consolidation of Citroen and Peugeot brand car lines on only three platforms.
Ford’s current plan includes a new Ford-brand crossover vehicle – probably a Toyota RAV4 competitor with five doors and all-wheel-drive – that will be made on the extended Focus platform and built in Genk, Belgium, alongside the Galaxy and Mondeo. Also being considered are more offerings in the sub-Fiesta minicar segment where Ford now only offers the three-door Ka.
On the larger platform, the Galaxy will be the first vehicle. The second Ford product off the larger platform will be the crossover in the second half of 2006, followed by the Mondeo replacement in early 2007.
