Legacy automaker Ford (F) has an advantage that you might not expect, but it recently revealed that advantage all the same. The advantage in question is its simulators, which can deliver 10 times as many tests in one-tenth of the time. This offers up a significant potential advantage against competitors in terms of product design. Ford investors seemed pleased as well, and sent Ford shares surging up over 3% in Thursday afternoon’s trading.
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The Ford Simulator program got its start with racetracks, reports note, as one designer saw the racetrack simulator and thought, why not us? The principles that make a simulator valuable at the racetrack would likely make them valuable for street-legal car development as well, so Ford started bringing in Product Development Simulators for regular cars.
The results were telling. Simulators can run in a day what may have taken six months in real-time, and Ford designers have tried everything from normal highway driving to emergency condition responses. Reports even note that the simulators allow Ford designers to run “…ten times as many tests in a tenth of the time.” Mechanics do not need to swap out parts after a test is completed; the simulator can simply reset and start all over again.
And Yes, Another Recall
It was starting to surprise me how long we had gone without hearing the word “recall” in Ford news, but Ford has brought me back to reality. Ford issued a recall on a little over 16,000 Broncos over a matter of their rooftops.
Apparently, reports note, the rooftop can “delaminate,” and chunks of the roof’s outer skin can come off. Those chunks can potentially be dangerous. This is particularly true if the vehicle happens to be moving at a high rate of speed when the delamination happens. Between chunks of the roof on the road, and chunks of the roof flying off at high speeds, the odds of a crash increase and pose a threat to drivers. Of the Broncos involved, 15,045 are 2021 Broncos, and 1,155 are 2022 Broncos. Dealerships will perform inspections and replacements where needed.
Is Ford Stock a Good Buy Right Now?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Hold consensus rating on F stock based on two Buys, nine Holds and one Sell assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 26.63% rally in its share price over the past year, the average F price target of $13.50 per share implies 1.24% downside risk.
