Ford has announced that it will be investing $4.5 billion into electrified vehicle solutions by 2020.
Ford plans to add 13 new electrified vehicles to its lineup by 2020, resulting in over 40 percent of its global nameplates having electrified variants. This investment will be the American automaker’s largest into electrified vehicles.
It will start with the new Ford Focus Electric that will debut next year featuring all-new DC fast-charging, capable of delivering an 80-percent charge in an estimated 30 minutes and projected 100-mile range.
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Along with the investment, Ford is changing its product development process to support a shift towards the customer experience rather than the vehicle itself. It will invest in social science-based research globally, helping observe how consumers interact with vehicles while gaining new insights into the cognitive, social, cultural, technological and economic nuances that affect product design. As a result, Ford will double the number of projects next year that use ethnographic research compared to this year.
“The challenge going forward isn’t who provides the most technology in a vehicle but who best organizes that technology in a way that most excites and delights people,” said Raj Nair, executive vice president, Product Development. “By observing consumers, we can better understand which features and strengths users truly use and value and create even better experiences for them going forward.”
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