June 17, 2020

Did Ford PH's Own Mother Company Spoil the F-150 Announcement?

Rendering courtesy of  the F150Gen14 Forum
How’s this for a plot twist? A day after Ford Philippines announced that they’re bringing in the F-150 to the Philippines, its own mother company, Ford Motor Company spoiled the party by announcing that the all-new F-150 will be revealed on June 25.

Now, this could mean one of two things.

First, the Philippines could skip the current F-150 altogether, and that the preempted teaser/announcement (and subsequent speculation from the Philippine press, us included) could simply be a placeholder for the all-new one. It’s entirely possible because the Ford Motor Company announcement did confirm that the F-150 will now be a global model.

Not much is known about the all-new F-150 except that it will ride on a brand-new platform, and will be made available with electrification from the start. In addition, it’ll receive regular Over-The-Air (OTA) updates to key modules improving its performance and user experience throughout its lifecycle.

Second, and this is a real bummer, Ford simply had too much stock of its existing F-150. Since they had to make room for their all-new electrified truck, they probably looked around at which markets could get the remaining stocks of the current F-150 without much re-tooling or modification. The Philippines, being left-hand drive, is a prime candidate.

If that’s the case, the Philippine dealers will find itself having to selling the “older” model even before they get the darn thing. It also also shows that the product people at Ford Philippines are not thinking ahead, and that they are doing a disservice to customers who expect subsidiaries or distributors to give them the newest and best available products in the market.

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