Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F)’s partnership with Baidu Inc (NASDAQ:BIDU) and Volkswagen can save a lot of money for the company. At a time when most of the automakers have advanced further and looking up towards the future with optimism and possibilities, Ford seems to have lost direction and is stuck in neutral.
Ford struggling to keep up pace with competitors
Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) started off facing troubles initially and later on managed to become the premier electric vehicles’ producer. Even the big luxury automakers from the Deutschland like BAYERISCHE MOTO/S ADR (OTCMKTS:BMWYY), Mercedes, Porsche, and Audi started rolling out versions of electric vehicles (EVs) as well as on the autonomous driving solutions.
Apart from these big names in the automobile world, Alphabet Inc Class C (NASDAQ:GOOG)’s Waymo is also coming forward with its autonomous Mobility-as-a-Service (Maas) driving race especially after General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) invested $1 billion in Cruised Automation two years ago. Over the years its value increased to around $14.5 billion after SoftBank and Honda Motor invested in the venture. All the other projects are doing well, whereas Ford’s plans related to Argo continues to stagnate. That is why investors are turning back to Ford. To top it all, the auto sales in China plummeted hugely for the first time in years whereas the trade wars have already squeezed profit margins for automakers in the U.S.
Ford aspires to change its fortune with new partnership deals
Ford recently announced a partnership with Chinese Baidu company for autonomous driving functions and with the owner of Porsche and Audi brands, Volkswagen in Europe for autonomous and electrification efforts. The company hopes that it will save Ford F-150 loads of money and will also help the company to catch up in the technological race in the world of automotive.
The automaker based in Dearborn teamed up with Chinese Baidu, an equivalent of Google to develop self-driving vehicles and test them on the Chinese roads. The two-year autonomous-vehicle testing project is the latest move of Ford in China almost a week after the company took a decision to cut off its Chinese business unit away from the Asia Pacific region.
