Winning and losing. Those are the two key metrics that legacy automaker Ford (F) hopes to use to turn things around. With Ford’s recall rates soaring and warranty expenses surging accordingly, some kind of turnaround is vital to Ford’s future. But investors were not especially happy about what they heard, sending Ford shares down nearly 2% in the closing minutes of Tuesday’s session.
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Over in the Dearborn Truck Plant, just inside the doors, is a big scoreboard labeled “Team, this is how we did yesterday.” A set of metrics is displayed therein, including fields like “quality of the vehicles,” “employee attendance,” “safety of employees,” and a few more. Then, the metrics are graded by one of two words: winning or losing. Winning metrics get a green smiley face, and losing metrics get a red frowning face.
Several of these boards—in the form of LED monitors—are scattered throughout the plant, reports note, allowing the workers to see how things are going at any given time of day. The boards were designed as a means to clearly demonstrate where issues are cropping up, and give employees some idea of how to address them. With Ford recently reaching 90 recalls for this year so far—beating a record of 77 previously held by General Motors (GM)—it was clear something needed to be done, and this is at least part of Ford’s attempt.
A New Kind of Heater
Granted, right now, no one is really thinking about their car’s heater. The outside is doing a fine job of heating itself, and the inside of Ford cars, as it stands. But winter is always just around the corner, and that heater will be vital once more. Ford may have an idea coming out soon for that: a fuel-operated heater.
A lot of car heat is delivered from the waste heat produced by the car’s engine. But that really only works with gasoline-powered vehicles. Electric vehicles need to consume the car’s battery to produce heat, and that can be a huge drain on power. Ford, however, got a patent for something completely different: a heater that burns fuel. While it is not specifically said just what kind of fuel the heater would burn, the patent drawings feature an item labeled “fuel” that looks a lot like a gas pump.
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, 12 Holds and three Sells assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 4.06% rally in its share price over the past year, the average F price target of $10.14 per share implies 8.53% downside risk.
