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FORD Australia will take another step towards becoming a global player this week, when a fleet of four BA Falcons is sampled in the US by FoMoCo's top management.

The Falcons, believed to comprise entry level XT, high series Fairmont Ghia, XR6 and XR6 Turbo models, will be chaperoned by Ford Australia vice president product development Trevor Worthington.

"There's a whole host of guys, from Bill Ford down, lined up to drive them," confirmed Ford Australia president Geoff Polites at last week's Falcon GT launch.

The test drive is the latest is a series of significant steps taken by Ford's Dearborn headquarters to become more familiar with Australia's Falcon - including a "paper study" into the viability of the model revealed exclusively by GoAuto in January - but Mr Polites was quick to play down the immediate significance of the exercise.

"I don't think anything will come from it," he said. "There are lots of things that theoretically make sense but there are lots of reasons why that theory doesn't happen."

For the first time, however, Mr Polites revealed the longer-term possibility of Ford Australia becoming integral to the design of a low-cost rear-wheel drive Blue Oval platform globally, in much the same way Holden will be employed by General Motors to design and engineer GM's low-cost rear-drive underpinnings beyond the next all-new model due in 2005.

Like Holden, Ford Australia would potentially gain valuable design and engineering funds from such an arrangement, which would reduce the cost of local development work considerably or fund the engineering for more derivative products, such as more Falcon-based recreational cross-over vehicles.

"Long term outcomes will not be us exporting Falcons into the US. Long term outcomes will be about platform sharing," said Mr Polites.

"If you were sitting here with a Ford hat on, the best outcome we could get would be for us to produce the low-cost platform and for our platform to be picked up in the US. Then you can do derivatives, you could do the (E265 crossover) wagon here and send it over there and it's relatively low volume.

"With our skill levels, our labour rates, with the dollar where it is, with ACIS, we are a very low cost of quality engineering. If you can do a platform (sharing) type arrangement then it lowers your engineering costs. Basically, it makes sense," he said.

Mr Polites, who has long maintained Ford Australia is viable as a domestic market-only business, continued to express pessimism for the possibility of any future exports apart from platform and/or engine technology.

While he was quick to dismiss suggestions the Falcon brand could be exported globally in a similar way to Holden - which has ambitions of selling its own Holden-badged products internationally - Mr Polites did not rule out Falcon exports long term.

Ford Australia's export hopes could be bolstered by the recent announcement of a wide- ranging review of FoMoCo's international operations.

Led by new global operations boss David Thursfield and his deputy, Ford family member Elena Ford, the sweeping review aims to make the company more profitable and efficient by taking "a very broad look at what exists in each place and the best way to drive business".


Story from Goauto.com.au
http://www.goauto.com.au/mellor/mell...256CD8003944CB