Ford Motor Co., the second-largest U.S. automaker, plans a tenfold increase in vehicles powered by gasoline-electric engines as it attempts to catch hybrid sales leader Toyota Motor Corp.
More than half of the company’s Ford, Lincoln and Mercury models will have hybrid versions by the end of the decade, chief executive William Clay Ford Jr., 48, said in an address to employees Wednesday.
That would bring the company’s annual hybrid output to 250,000. The company’s hybrids will be profitable by 2010, Ford said after his address.
Ford billed himself as an environmentalist when he took over as chairman in 1999. The Sierra Club’s Dan Becker, who had criticized William Ford’s 2003 disclosure that the company wouldn’t deliver on a promise to boost mileage in sport utility vehicles by 25 percent, welcomed his announcement.
“Ford is at the bottom of the barrel among major automakers on fuel economy, but today is a better day,” said Becker, Washington, D.C., director of the Sierra Club’s Global Warming Program. “Increasing hybrid production is a good step in the right direction.”
Ford’s North American operations lost money in three of the last four quarters. William Ford said a restructuring plan may come within 100 days.
He hopes to convince consumers and investors that the company is becoming more innovative, not just smaller, said David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich.
“On hybrids, it’s a question of whether there’s significant demand for a product that’s significantly more expensive,” Cole said before Wednesday’s announcement.
