This is a JD Power survey that looks at how many problems new cars have soon after people buy them. If a company ranks well, it usually means fewer early defects and headaches for owners.
Culture change means changing how a company thinks and works day to day. In this story, the idea is that better quality came from people and habits, not just new machines.
Automated factories are factories that use machines and computers to do most of the work. The hosts are saying the story here is that automation alone didn’t fix everything—people with experience still mattered a lot.
Term
AI
AI here means computer software that can learn patterns and help make decisions. The hosts say they had to retrain it because it wasn’t getting things right.
The truck department is the team that makes the company’s trucks. The host is saying the changes they described seem to be working especially well for trucks.
The Ford Mustang is a sporty car made by Ford. People buy it for its performance and classic look, and it can also be used as a normal daily car. The podcast mentions it alongside other cars as part of a practical discussion.
Ford Pro is Ford’s commercial-vehicle and fleet-focused business unit. It focuses on selling trucks and vans plus services for businesses, like managing fleets and related recurring offerings.
Term
subscription rate
A “subscription rate” is how many people are paying every month or year for a service instead of just buying it once. It’s a way to measure how fast that service is growing.
“Margins” here means profitability measured as a percentage of revenue. The speaker compares Ford’s margins to General Motors’ margins, which is a standard way to judge how much profit a business generates per dollar of sales.
Person
Max for Stappin
“Max for Stappin” is almost certainly Max Verstappen, the Dutch Formula 1 driver. In this segment, the host is speculating whether Verstappen could be involved in an Aston Martin hypercar comeback.
Car
twenty twenty six Mercedes AMG SL sixty three S Performance
This is a super high-end Mercedes-AMG roadster. It’s basically a powerful, luxury convertible version of the SL, tuned by AMG for a more exciting drive.
Carbon fiber trim is decorative material made from a strong, lightweight fiber. It usually looks sporty and can help reduce weight compared with some other materials.
A touch screen is the big display you tap to control the car’s features. The host is saying this car uses the screen a lot instead of lots of physical buttons.
Infotainment is the car’s main screen system for things like music, maps, and phone features. The host is saying this one is easy to use and responds quickly.
MSRP is the price the manufacturer puts on the car’s sticker. It’s not necessarily the final price you pay once you add things like destination, taxes, and dealer extras.
Driver assistance is a set of safety features that help the car stay in its lane, slow down for hazards, or assist with driving tasks. It’s usually an optional package.
PTS paint means you’re choosing a special custom paint color for a Porsche. It usually costs extra compared with regular factory paint options.
Term
mail pattern color blindness
They’re joking about whether someone’s color perception could be off when comparing paint shades. The point is they’re trying to confirm the exact paint color.
A destination charge is a fee automakers add to cover shipping the vehicle from the factory to the dealer. It’s often listed separately from the base price, so the “promised” price can look lower until you add this cost.
The Ford Maverick is a smaller, cheaper pickup truck. The hosts mention it to show that the alternative “cheap” truck isn’t as good of a deal once extra fees are included.
Miles per gallon equivalent is a fuel-economy number that lets you compare an electric or hybrid car to a gas car. It turns the car’s energy use into a “gas-like” mpg figure.
“Combined” means the mileage estimate averages different kinds of driving, like city and highway. It’s a single number meant to represent everyday mixed use.
The national average is a general reference price for gas across the U.S. The point here is that the host’s local gas price is still much higher than that average.
This is a Mercedes-AMG SL 63 S hybrid version. The “E Performance” part is the clue it uses an electric assist, and the host is saying it’s a hybrid done in a performance way.
A hybrid uses both a gas engine and an electric motor. It can feel quicker and more efficient, but it’s also more complicated than a normal gas-only car, so repairs can be harder.
“Right to repair” is about whether regular mechanics and owners can get the information and parts needed to fix cars. The host is saying hybrids add extra systems, which can make repairs more complicated.
The Aston Martin DBS is a luxury sports car. It’s designed to be both fast and comfortable for longer drives. The podcast mentions someone driving a DBS convertible, which is the open-top version.
Apple CarPlay lets you connect your iPhone to the car so you can use certain apps on the car’s screen. The speaker is saying Aston Martin’s setup can be annoying because the connection sometimes stops working.
Wireless CarPlay means you don’t have to plug your phone in to use CarPlay. The speaker is basically saying the tech feels behind and can be frustrating to get working.
Bluetooth is the wireless connection your phone uses to talk to the car. The speaker is saying you shouldn’t have to keep re-connecting it all the time.
Carbon ceramic brakes are a high-performance brake type that can handle repeated hard stops without weakening as much. They’re common on expensive, track-focused versions of performance cars.
“ZF eight speed” means the car uses an automatic transmission with eight gears made by ZF. The speaker is saying it shifts and drives in a way that feels really good.
A dual-clutch transmission is an automatic gearbox that uses two clutches to change gears quickly. The speaker is pointing out this car doesn’t use that type of gearbox.
A “twin turbo” engine uses two turbochargers to help the engine make more power. “V eight” means it has eight cylinders arranged in a V shape, and together they describe a specific kind of engine.
This means a regular gasoline engine that’s boosted with a turbocharger. The turbo helps the engine make more power by forcing more air into the cylinders.
A Bloomberg terminal is a specialized computer system used by finance people. The host is joking that the kind of person who buys these expensive, rare cars probably uses one at work.
Term
depreciate so significantly
They’re saying the car loses value quickly after you buy it. That’s why, five years later, shoppers can often get the same car for much less money.
The Porsche 911 Turbo S is a very fast, expensive version of the Porsche 911. It uses a turbocharged engine, and the point here is whether it’s smart to pay top dollar for a brand-new one.
The Aston Martin V8 Vantage is a sporty Aston Martin with a V8 engine. The speaker specifically likes the 2016 version with a manual gearbox because they think it’s more fun than buying something new and pricey.
Depreciation means a car’s value drops as it gets older. The speaker’s point is that buying used can be cheaper because the car has already lost some of its value.
The Mercedes G Wagon is a tough-looking SUV with a very distinctive, traditional feel. In this part, the speaker explains they bought one after a newer generation came out because they liked how it drove better.
The G-Class is a luxury SUV with a very recognizable, boxy shape. It’s built to handle rough roads better than many regular SUVs. The podcast mentions a new generation of it and why that update was important.
The Ford F-150 is a large pickup truck. People choose it for towing, hauling, and general truck tasks. The podcast mentions it while talking about trucks the speaker bought and compared.
Car
Ford Raptor
The Ford Raptor is a special version of the Ford pickup made for rough off-road driving. Here they’re talking about an older Raptor with a 6.2-liter V8 engine, which they think was the best version.
The Mercedes-Benz SL 63 is a high-performance version of the SL roadster, known for combining luxury with a powerful V8 and strong performance. The host mentions it as a serious consideration for a new-car purchase, contrasting it with other options.
The Porsche 911 Turbo is a fast, turbocharged version of the 911 sports car. They mention a specific 911 Turbo generation (991.2) but say they wouldn’t choose it.
“Virtue signaling” means trying to look morally right in front of other people. The host thinks the license plate is meant to show a stance, not just be a normal plate.
A bumper sticker is a sticker you put on the back of a car. Here it means someone is showing a negative opinion about Elon Musk with a visible sign on their car.
A license plate is the official identification tag mounted on a vehicle for legal registration and identification. The host uses it as part of the “signaling” theme—suggesting you can’t have certain plate styles if you’re trying to avoid being associated with Tesla/Elon Musk.
The Tesla Model 3 is an electric sedan. The point being made is that some people bought it before they knew much about Elon Musk’s later public controversies.
Elon Musk is the high-profile person behind Tesla. The hosts are debating whether buyers should consider who’s behind a car brand when they purchase it.
They’re using “chainsaw” as a metaphor, meaning “things got wildly disruptive.” It’s describing how Musk’s life and attention became more intense, not anything about the car itself.
J.D. Power is a company that ranks cars based on how customers experience them. The point here is that being #1 is supposed to mean the cars are genuinely better, not just advertised more.
A flat plane crankshaft is a specific design inside an engine that affects how it revs and how smoothly it runs. It can make the engine feel more exciting, but it can also be tougher to keep durable over time.
A manual transmission is a gearbox where you choose the gears yourself, typically using a clutch. The hosts are saying Ford kept manuals for enthusiasts instead of going fully automatic.
The Chevrolet Camaro is a sporty two-door car made for performance driving. It’s the kind of car people compare to other similar muscle cars. The podcast mentions it while talking about which models were canceled and when.
The Dodge Challenger is a muscle car. The hosts bring it up because it also got canceled, which helped reduce the number of cars offering manuals for enthusiasts.
J.D. Power is a company that surveys owners about how reliable and problem-free new cars are. Here, they’re using those early-quality results to talk about Ford improving.
The Ford F-150 is a very popular pickup truck. Here, the speaker is saying Ford builds it at a big factory and uses lots of quality checks to make sure every truck is built correctly.
Vision systems use cameras and sensors to inspect parts and assembly quality. Adding AI helps the system recognize defects or misalignment more reliably than simple rule-based checks.
A warranty is the promise that if the car breaks in certain ways within a certain time, the company pays for the repair. “Warranty coverage” is basically how much of that promise they’re having to use—so if it goes down, it often means fewer problems are happening.
A bill of materials is basically a shopping list for building a product—every part and material needed. If they review it, they’re trying to find ways to lower the cost of those parts.
Subscription growth refers to the rate at which customers sign up for recurring, paid services rather than buying once. Here it’s framed as a key part of Ford Pro’s business model, alongside vehicle sales and commercial fleet usage.
Powertrain durability means the main mechanical parts that make the car move—like the engine and transmission—should keep working reliably for a long time. They’re saying they test for that kind of long-term reliability.
The transmission is the part that helps the engine’s power reach the wheels in the right way. It’s important for reliability because it has to handle lots of shifting and stress over time.
Axles are the parts that connect the drivetrain to the wheels and help deliver power. They take a lot of stress, so they’re a common target in long-mileage reliability testing.
Predictive maintenance means the car (or fleet system) watches for warning signs that a part is about to fail. Instead of fixing it after it breaks, you plan the repair ahead of time so the vehicle can keep working.
Prognostics is a fancy way of saying the system tries to figure out how much life a part has left. It helps predict when something will need attention before it causes trouble.
Energy storage batteries are batteries that store electricity so it can be used later. They can help the power grid and big facilities like data centers stay supplied reliably.
Battery electric storage means batteries are used to save electricity for later use. Instead of relying only on the grid in real time, the facility can draw from stored power.
Microsoft is a major tech company that runs huge data centers. In this segment, they’re mentioned as a possible customer for large battery storage systems.
The Ford Escape is a compact SUV, which is a small-to-medium family vehicle. It’s meant for daily driving and practical use. The podcast talks about it in terms of sales and business decisions.
LIVE
Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News. I'm Hannah Elliott and
I'm Matt Miller.
This is Hot Pursuit.
Coming up on today's podcast. Matt had a great interview
with Ford's Jim Farley that we're going to discuss.
Yeah, and we'll play the whole interview for you, because Ford actually moved to the top spot on JD Power's initial quality survey. So among the large manufacturers, not including
you know, Niche, like Ferrari or even Portia, but the major car makers, Ford is number one in quality and it's a huge turnaround from where they were in twenty twenty three, they were number fifteen.
Yeah, that's a really big deal. And automakers still really
care about this because I you know, heard from Frank, our friend at Porsche earlier today that Porsche is also claiming a top spot on JD powers.
Quality an overall quality, So including you know carmakers like them, they are number one, but you expect you expect it from from Porsche. I had a nine to eleven for
ten years and never never once had a mechanical issue with it. You guys have had like fifty of them. So,
but it's for Ford it's it's an amazing comeback story.
I was comparing it when I talked with Jim to like Tiger Woods winning the Masters in twenty nineteen, or you know, uh Jordan coming back and winning the championship, Mark Marquez, Mark Marquez winning the Moto GP World Championship last year after almost ending his career from injury. So
it's like an incredible comeback.
And Jim is basically crediting what is he given credit to.
He's saying it's a culture change up Ford.
Right, I mean, yeah, it's really it's really the humans.
The humans have done a great job.
So it's not robots.
No.
I mean I would have thought hearing so much about automated factories in China that build hugely uh successful cars with you know, perfect panel gaps, I would have thought that using AI or like technology to monitor suppliers or improve factory processes. Note what happened was they said, we
need to bring back our older and wiser, you know, engineers that have maybe retired or gone on. So they
call them gray beards, right, the men and women probably way the women don't have beards.
But wait a second, they brought back three hundred and fifty older employees to come back and not only train youngs, yeah, but also to train to retrain the AI that had just not been doing it right.
That is so interesting, and I'm seeing it really help them in the truck department especially.
Well, which I mean it's all they well.
Don't forget the Mustang. It also help with the misting right.
Oh, but they make their money from the trucks and the SUVs and the vans, and look, they make an absolute ton of money from Ford Pro, which is their professional unit that has double digits. They have he said,
thirty to forty percent subscription rate subscription growth. So the
business seems to be doing really well. It's still not
on par in terms of margins with their crosstown rivals, General Motors, Like they both in the first quarter had forty three plus billion dollars in sales. But over the
year GM is expecting ten to maybe fifteen billion dollars in pretext earnings, whereas Ford is expecting eight and a half to ten and a half billion dollars of pretext earnings.
We'll hear all about this.
In the Can't Wait to Listen the interview at Jim Farr and Jim was a great interview too.
He is he looks fantastic, does he? I was thinking
as I sat down, like, I know he's so successful because he's such a hard worker and he had such a long career at Toyota. And that's part of the
reason that this is so such good news for him, because he you know, he beat Toyota and Honda and Hondai and Kia.
Like he's beating he's in the ring.
Yeah. But also he's so good looking.
Oh stop it now, yes, it is. When I first
saw journalistic on camera today, now was like a beautiful man.
This is sounding No, no, that's got to help.
That's got to help in terms of his success.
I hope he doesn't listen to this. It's not we
don't need to stroke as ego at all.
Oh. I also got to talk to him a lot
about racing because exactly so, like I was wondering if Max for Stappin is gonna drive their hypercar comeback.
You know, they're feel like we're seeing it happen.
I hope. But the thing is, I said, listen, do
you have Max locked in for uh, what do you say?
Ford red Bull F one next year? And he was
like No, he has. The thing is he has a
clause in his contract that the car has to be competitive.
So yes, Max is going to still race in F one.
He's confirmed next year, but it's not one hundred percent that he's going to still have the same seat at Ford Red Bull. I'm sure that he will, but there
are rumors, you know, that he could go elsewhere for sure.
I think the one thing we know about Max Verstappan is what he really cares about is racing, full stop.
That's what he cares about.
He doesn't he doesn't care about anything else, and that's why we.
Love him absolutely. I mean, and it's like, say, he
wants to.
Be in the best he wants to be in the best car with the best team, the best chance to win. Period.
Yep, you know, it's very simple, all right.
By the way, speaking of racing, I don't know if you've had a chance to watch the Kevin Magnus in NASCAR event.
I hadn't.
Oh, you are in for a treat when you do. Now, first,
do you get to watch it?
You have not traditionally been a NASCAR.
I haven't, No, And what did happen?
So?
I mean, because it's a moment that's gone viral. I
mean this is I spend more time on social media than you do, and I'm not proud of that.
I'm trying to literally get to zero.
I'm not I'm not proud of that fact. But you
can't go on Twitter without if you're into motorsports.
Without seeing Twitter completely.
Without seeing people issue an opinion on k Mag in NASCAR.
So he was invited to do a race by UH track House. So track House, which also has a very
successful Moto GP team, is active in NASCAR, and they bring occasionally drivers from other leagues, and so he brought Kevin Magnuson. He's currently driving you know BMW, the BMW
hypercar and WEC.
Yes, I think he great River.
Yeah, he got pole position at Lamon And anyway, he goes into NASCAR and he's got a driver in front of him that won't get out of the way, Noah Gregson, who's like a third generation NASCAR family driver, and he bumps Noah and then throughout the next like I know, the next ten, fifteen, twenty laps, Noah Gregson is obsessed with k Mag. He's like bumping him, pulling up beside him,
giving him the finger hanging beside him, like not passing him, because what's important to Noah is giving k Mag the thing.
He's so angry at these snobby open wheel drivers who come into my You're gonna come to my NASCAR and teach me how to drive exactly and the whole time, like you can listen to clips of it on YouTube or on Twitter or whatever. K Mag is like, man,
this redneck is is really annoyed with me, and like he just bothered exactly. So finally, you know, after I
don't know how many laps, but countless laps, finally k Mag says all right, I've had enough and just knocks Noah Gregson, spins him and sends him into the wall. Right,
And Noah Gregson threw an absolute fit after the race, like ran over to him, why you crash me? Why
you crash me? And k Mag was just like, you
know what, and then find out, buddy, that's right, that's how it goes here. Anyway. Gregson is superid off. But
I think most everybody thinks that k Mag was in the right totally.
Okay, thank you for that quick catchup. Yeah, and I'm
one thousand percent and I'll.
I will watch the tapes.
It's worth it on this, on this first blush, I'm totally pro Kevin on this.
Yeah.
And you know what, here's how I know that Noah is an inferior driver. And I'll say this with no
actual knowledge of anything in this arena.
Please do because that's what everybody on Twitter.
Is doing too, because he was out of control because he got emotional. Yes, And the minute you get emotional,
and I know, I know race, and I know driving on tracks, I've done it for many years and I've been around a lot of professional drivers and drive instructors.
The minute you let your emotions control what you do on the track, you're done.
Yeah. Period, Absolutely, he got a little bit of hot,
he got hot under.
The mullet, he got out, and he let Kevin come in and control the whole situation. So I don't even
need to see the video, although I will watch it.
It's worth watching anyway.
Yeah, I already know no Kevin was out of control.
That's too bad.
It's And the funny thing is, you know NASCAR does this Obviously they want a little bit of marketing help from other leagues. So you bring in somebody from you know,
F one or you bring in somebody from WEC, and people that normally would only watch F one or WC they watch the NASCAR race because Kmag's driving or whoever it is, and then maybe they get interested.
And co ellination.
It's worked for me because now I'm gonna start watching NASCAR like religiously. And at the time, I hope also
that Kmag gets a permanent seat, because it would he set the fastest lap of the entire race of all the drivers.
That's so cool. And this is why, like remember the
race of Champions that they did in the eighties, like the Iraq races. This this goes into like we all
want to see who the best driver is, regardless of the series. And this goes back to like what we
were talking about, why don't F one drivers drive an Indy And we had a whole conversation with Zach Brown about that and he gave us his reasons that he thought which were very interesting and I could see, but like, don't we all want to see all of these great drivers from Indy, from Lama, from F one, from NASCAR, like all just go all out. They would never agree
on a car and they would never all agree on a track.
But this is what we want to see.
Absolutely, bring back Iraq. I would love to see it.
And you know, some people have made the suggestion like there should be a series where they switch off car so drivers, but then they would complain that that car was better for that track, and I don't know. I'm
happy that there's so much great racing to watch these days, so I'm all in. Obviously, Moto GP is insane. Mark Marquez,
by the way, last weekend was nuts and Moto GP.
Just to quick I know there's a car podcast, but just a quick two weird round up. Uh Marco Betseeki,
who was leading the championship a month ago by over one hundred points above Mark, he crashed in the sprint on Saturday. A marshall, one of these volunteer workers, you know,
safety workers, came out and tried to pick up his bike and accidentally goosed the throttle and bet Seki got so mad that he slapped the marshal, slapped him, then he turned off the bike. Then he stood up again
and slapped him again in the face. You know, maybe
a little frustrated because he wrecked, and also a little bit worried about his motor. I get that, but you
don't slap a marshal who's volunteering his time to help your sport, right, It's just not cool. So he was
so he was suspended from the race, and he lost all of all of his points. Oh no, and Mark
won the race. So now Mark, in the span of
a month has gone from a deficit of one hundred and five points to forty points behind the leader. And
it's just amazing to watch, amazing.
Incredible, And it's this type I don't I can't condone slapping of race.
Marshal, but it is kind of funny, it is.
I mean, and this goes to show, like I think we need strong personalities and moments of uncontrolled surprise just like this to make this type of thing interesting.
It is so dramatic, and all the Italian fans they hate Mark, you know, so they're all, you know, caught in a position where they have to kind of defend bet Seki. Mark rises above it all as usual and says, hey,
don't give them too much crap. He's he's young, we're
all young, we're all learning in front of millions of people.
It's very emotional, like this kind of thing can happen, but it's just amazing to watch and you get it, uh, there was because of this an old clip surface where James Hunt had a similar incident. He wrecked a car
and a marshall ran up to see if he was okay and try and help him get off the track, and James Hunt punched like, clocked the marshal in the face.
But to his credit, Hunt like looks down, starts to walk away, and then realizes what he's done. Then he
turns around and gives the marshal a huge hug and they walk off like arm in arms.
Bros. That would never happen with women on so many loves,
but this.
Okay, do you not think do you not think it would?
Women won't physically fight and then all of a sudden be friends.
That's because dudes do that. That's that's that's bros.
That's standard operating.
That's easier.
But my point is, obviously these guys are running on so high levels of adrenaline and testosterone when they're in their sport doing their sport, especially racing at that high level, that like you can't just turn it off off. The
emotions run high. This is this is why, like when
something bad happens, they're obviously still all hyped up on adrenaline and testosterone. It reminds me of something that Total
Wolf told me, which was something like, if you want to lie in behind the steering wheel, you can't expect a puppy dog outside of the car. True, it just
doesn't work if you want someone who's extremely aggressive.
And you know, I think we were exceptional.
You were talking to him about the car. Yeah, you know,
you're one hundred percent right. I remember when he told
you that.
Yeah, it's and it's so true. I'm not excusing bad behavior,
but like I kind of get it. And also I've
been watching you've been watching NASCAR clips. I've been watching
clips of Dennis Rodman for the past week.
Wow.
I don't know. I don't know why, Like somehow my algorithm.
I'm just obsessed with Dennis Rodman right now. And I
just love his attitude. I just love it. He He's
the classic example of it's the most difficult ones that have the most to give. And I have a big
soft spot for people who have so much spirit they just you just need to channel it.
Do not disagree, right, I do not disagree. Let's get
to the cars we're driving. Because you sent you sent
me a picture. I thought you were going to be
driving the M two, the BMWM two this week.
I'm getting that in like a week. Okay, I'm getting
that in a week or so.
You sent me a picture of a gorgeous Mercedes.
US even it took my breath away slightly.
So what is it?
So? This is the twenty twenty six Mercedes AMG SL
sixty three S Performance. I hate all of their naming things,
but it's basically an SL sixty three in light moss green, which is a ten thousand dollars option.
Of course, it's worth every penny.
It's so pretty. It's not a racing green. It's not teal,
it's the perfect it's not all of It's a true light moss green with black NAPA interior, red contrast stitching carbon fiber trim. It's got the red badging for the
AMG SL sixty three S E Performance line. And it's
a convertible.
So, so is this not the same car that was your choice for Car of the Year last year?
This is the convertible version of my favorite car of the year last year.
So no wonder you took a short answer.
To your question I guess I still stand by my choice from last year and I had. It's been like
basically a year since I've been in this model. This
is a convertible version, and you know what, I'm sticking with my choice. It's so I'm smiling. I'm just smiling.
It's so great.
I love it.
Yeah, I have driven the slick Top, not the Cabrio, and I was in love with it as well. It's
like so much power, I think it happens, yes, so much torque. It's like, I don't know, fifteen hundred newton
meters or over one thousand pound feet of torque.
One forty seven according to the specs.
Yeah, and like driving it is an absolute pleasure. It
does feel kind of heavy. Steering is a little heavy.
I did not find that to be true.
Well, I mean I mean that in a good way.
Maybe solid is a better word.
Sure, very precise, but confidence inspiring.
I also think like everything inside works perfectly. The touch screen,
I mean there aren't buttons and knobs as much as I'd like. You have to go into touch screens, but it's.
Not like barely.
Yeah, they do the best infotainment basically set up that there is. It's a giant screen, right, it's like a
large iPad size.
It's I wouldn't say giant, it's it's there. It's it's
large ish, but it's not giant. It's at your easy
fingertip within reach. Everything is easy. I sinked my bluetooth
in about five seconds.
You know that tilts. This green tilts so that you can.
You don't have to go with a bunch of layers of software. It's everything is you know, top layer options.
When you're sinking things and using the radio, which is the number one thing, and probably the climate too is the number one thing. All of that's easy. It just
is like a big exhale. But also it's really fast.
It does weigh about five pounds, so it's I'm seeing the non convertible version four and thirty nine pounds pishposh.
So you know, I'm just saying like it's very heavy, and I mean that's almost as much as my old BMW seven sixty. But the interesting thing.
Is, yes, and I will say compared to that too.
I see in my piece from last year, I did note that the nine to eleven turbos weighs thirty eight hundred pounds. So yeah, it's heavier, you don't feel it.
And but the thing, so my issue with with this car if I have any issue, because I think I agree with you. It's one of the best cars new
cars you can buy if you have unlimited funds.
Yeah, if you have a lot of money.
The problem is it does cost like a quarter of a million dollars, right. What's the all in with options
MSRP on the model that you're driving?
The model I have this week, all in including the ten thousand dollars paint job, the AMG Performance seats for twenty five hundred a night package, driver assistance, all that stuff, two hundred thousand, two hundred and twenty eight thousand dollars, seven hundred and.
Fifty So two thirty okay, yeah, two thirty.
Because that's probably not including the destination charge.
That is, including destination and delivery. That's all in.
The suggested read tail price is two hundred and eight thousand.
So I mean a couple comments that I would make is how much was the paint The paint.
Was paint to be exact, was nine nine hundred dollars.
There was a funny thing I saw on Twitter this week and I double checked it to be true. Portia
offers a shark blue option as a PTS paint to sample. Yeah,
it's it's about fifteen thousand dollars if you wanted a non GT nine to eleven.
That's an exclusive manufacturer.
Yes, but Folkswagen used to offer it as a standard option on a golf as cornflower blue, and it was three hundred dollars.
Are you sure it's the same, exact same, exactly. Sure
you don't have mail mail pattern color blindness.
No, I have double checked. I mean, I oh, sac
check with AI. So maybe it's a scoop. Yeah, fifteen
grand if you want it as a PTS on the on the nine to eleven, three hundred dollars, if you wanted it on your boss.
Well that's that is. I don't like to be taken
for a fool.
I mean, I mean, I guess if you're if you're buying a new nine to eleven, being taken for a fool isn't something that bothers you. And and for A,
it's a non GT option, so you're not buying the car to flip like if you're buying a GT three A it's less and B it doesn't matter because you're not gonna drive it, You're just gonna sell it and bring a trailer. But the other thing is destination charges.
I feel like a lot of people aren't including those as part of the price, but why would you not?
This week it's non negotiable.
What's what's the name of the Amazon spinoff or the Jeff Bezos company that makes the cheap pickup truck slate slate right there. They have been for years saying we're
gonna come out with this super cheap pickup truck, and it's just totally bare bones, no options, and you want to you can change it up, customize it yourself, and it's going to be twenty thousand dollars. Now they've come
out with the price in quotes right because they're not including the destination charge. It's twenty five grand. And if
you put the it's going to be one thousand dollars destination charge.
It'll probably be fifteen hundred.
So it's gonna be thirty percent more than the price they were promising us. And basically that's like you're already
could buy a Ford Maverick. So it doesn't seem to
be the great thing that we thought it would. And
but my whole point is I want people to include destination charges.
Might well, I agree, you include you're not getting around it.
The cost to design it, to build it, to market it, to ship it, those all should be in the price.
I totally agree. I totally agree. I think I should disclose.
This is a tiny pivot to but on this car, it is a hybrid car. We haven't talked about that.
They're basically saying you'll probably get around twenty nine to thirty miles per gallon equivalent combined.
Oh, combine.
People still pay attention to that. I don't know, do
they I've I didn't until I got this. Well, that's
new BMW.
And that's new. I mean your BMW is not a hybrid, right.
No, But it's still it's like I'm lucky to get eleven I'm lucky to get double digits miles per gallon.
Maybe it's the way territory and the prices are still.
I pulled up to a shell station last week and by the way, we're recording this on Thursday, the twenty fifth of game Stamp. Last week, when I filled it
up for the first time, it was like six dollars and sixty cents for ninety three octane at the shell station near me. I know that the national average for
gasoline has fallen now to below four dollars, but that's for regular fuel.
It's not in Cali, and it's.
Not in Cali or in New York. It's still super high.
The hybrid, Yeah, they used that so that amg SL sixty three s E performance. The E performance is the
giveaway that it's a hybrid and it uses like some fround inspired tech.
That's I This is to me is a case where a hybrid I'm fine with.
I mean me too.
It adds weight, but like it's great.
Love it. Oh, I'm okay with hybrids, as you know.
And in so many cases, yeah, I love the I love the E Ray hybrid.
More things I think could be probably hybrid and no, and no one would really bat and eye.
And nobody would know except for uh, it makes it much harder to repair it yourself. Right, it's one more layer.
We're talking about them.
No, we're not going to talk to right about right to repair, not right now.
Not right now, but you should talk about your aston Martin.
Yes, so and and by the way, this is where I think a comparison is apt between the Mercedes you're driving and the and the Aston Martin. So I'm driving
the Aston Martin DBS twelve Valante the convertible, the convertible version.
And we both have convertibles. Yeah, quick question.
How often do you drive the top down?
I all the time, Like I always put the top down because I don't drive convertibles very much. And also
I'm a New York so you know, the weather isn't always doesn't always allow me, so when I can, I do.
And by the way, the car is as you would expect.
It's amazing, Like it's beautiful, absolutely gorgeous. The paint is
so deep and sparkly. The design. You know, every time
I look at it when I walk out, I think I might get a James Bond. And it's also an
absolute joy to drive. It too, feels heavy or solid
maybe is a better word, but I don't mind. The
acceleration is addictive, the way it sounds, the way it feels, the way it builds up, and the steering is heavy and a really good way. It's totally I trust myself
driving it fast. The breaks are confidence inspiring, like the
seating position is great, the interior, the leather is beautiful, like everything is good, except for the maintainment system is just like a continued failure from Aston Martin.
And they they know that they know it, and they have.
Come out with like they were one of the first, maybe still the only manufacturer to use car car Play plus like the extended version of Apple's Car Play, And yet every Aston Martin I get, I hook up the phone the first day, and then the next day or later that day, I get in the car and it doesn't work. And I have no idea how to get
the car Play to work other than disconnecting my phone and then redoing it again. And I can't imagine the
anger you would experience as an owner who's paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for a car and every time she or he drives it, you've got to reset your iPhone connection. It's it's maddening.
It's maddening, and it's like this little gnat that keeps it.
It's like kind of a small thing, but it's so annoying because it's he's there. It's like this gnat that
is just pestering and pestering. And I remember when I
had the dB twelve, Uh not the convertible the coop and uh. In my piece, I mentioned that they had
integrated a center touch touch screen, which was an upgrade because the dB eleven didn't have any touchscreen at all.
Right, or wireless car play right, Yeah.
Yes, And to your point, Matt, it just feels like these cars, I don't I don't get. They just feel
so far behind technology. They are just so far behind.
I mean, you should never have to deal with recinking bluetooth.
The truth is, it's such an expensive vehicle. And if
you're gonna buy this car instead of a nine to eleven, well you probably have a nine to eleven, right, or I mean it's got to be your third car, and.
It's definitely your third car.
If it's definitely if.
I had that much money, I still would buy this car because Okay, it's it's different, because yes, you know, it's it's more unique. Yeah, you don't see them very often.
Yes, and it makes you look twice.
It feels like such a special experience it and it is like, yes, in terms of driving tech, amazing, Like it's the carbon ceramic brakes are standard. It's got you know,
seven hundred horse power, it has six hundred pound feet of torque. It's everything. It checks every box right, It's
got a great transmission. It's not a dual clutch, but
It's robust. But you can barely see the screen because
there's so much glare. There's no contrast. It's it looks
like boxy and uh, you know, maybe they're using sixty four bit technology, you know, like my old Nintendo. I
don't know, but let's.
Put this in really stark terms. You have a it
is a is a B twelve right, No, sorry, misleading, it is misleading you call it.
I think the dB twelve they should have gone straight to thirteen because it has a four leter twin turbo V eight. It's an amazing motor. I have no problem
with the motor. It doesn't bother me that it's not
a V twelve. Okay, everybody I show it to in
my block when I say dB twelve like, oh wow, you're breathing twelve cylinder engine, I'm.
Like, yeah, okay, so too. Okay, So even more to
my point, we've got two convertibles that are eight cylinder cars.
In fact, they're pretty much the same motive.
It's very very similar.
Because Aston Martin buys these motors from Mercedes. Pens Right,
So Mercedes.
Has more horse power and is actually less expensive, drives arguably better, I would say, with a far superior infotainment system and it costs less. Maybe you could say the
Aston Martin is a more beautiful, more classically beautiful car.
It is, I might.
Say that, but does that outweigh everything else? Well?
Ultimately, which would you choose?
So to be clear, this is the engine is directly sourced from Mercedes. So the reason that the Mercedes that
you're driving has more power is because of its hybrid component. Sure,
and it has electric motors, right, This doesn't. This is
just a turbo charged gas motor. So if they made
it a hybrid, it probably would be the same, or or they would insist that it's more. If you're going
to have a car like this as a daily driver, you take the MRK every time, like it's cheaper and it's easier to use. It's superior to probably live with.
If you're going to have this car as for a special occasion, you know, or to or to make a statement, you take the ast In because you'll never see another.
You rarely see another one in New York. I mean
obviously La London. Yeah, I do buy maybe.
You see them, but they're more rare, certainly.
But the but the bottom line also is at this price level for a new car, like very few people if you, if you don't work at SpaceX, like, there are hardly any people out there that are going to go and drop essentially a quarter of a million bucks on the murk or you know, three hundred thousand plus on the on the ass ten.
Yeah, but they're out there.
They're out there for sure.
And they probably have a Bloomberg terminal. It might be listening.
That's definitely.
You know, we're always told at pursuits, and I agree.
The real, real, the real scarcity in resources is time, not money for.
A lot of our people, for our clients.
Yeah, it's time.
Maybe not for our listeners.
Maybe not for our listeners. But that's okay, I mean,
I get it, it's time. It's not the money is
not the limiting factors.
Well, the thing I think for people listening to this podcast, most of people I know who listen to it, and by the way, a lot of people listen to this podcast.
I got so much feedback last week, What do you mean?
Just so many people wrote, wrote to me, emailed me, texted me, called me because they heard from listening to this that I had gotten that new oh seven sixty, And I was like, wow, cool people listen. But I
think so. I think the the commonality of many of
our listeners is that they see this, they see in Aston Martin like this, and they are interested in care you know, and love to look at it and hear about out drives. And then also five years later they're
shopping for it because they depreciate so significantly.
There you go, right there.
Your were just doing our bit for anywhere along the sales chain, well start or the middle or the end of it.
And I think also, like everybody, or like a lot of people, I like to think about what I would do if I did work at SpaceX and all of a sudden I had ten million dollars. Would I buy this? No,
I still probably wouldn't pay three hundred and fifty thousand dollars for it, And I wouldn't pay for a new nine to eleven Turbo S And I wouldn't pay for that new Mercedes.
I might not me because you know.
What, I would rather go get a two thousand and sixteen Acid Martin V eight Vantage with three pedals. I
would still I still want that depreciation. Yes, I still
want to be because I can have just as good a time, even better with the.
Stick for sure.
And I'm only gonna on the on the twenty sixteen.
I'm only going to spend sixty sixty five grand for a sweet one.
Have you ever actually bought a new car off the lot?
I bought a new uh G five hundred. Oh was
that wagon?
Why did you buy that new?
Because?
What made it worth it to you?
Because so? Because I bought it in twenty nineteen, right
when they had come out with the new generation of G Wagon.
And that was important.
Unlike the purists, I did not enjoy the steering on the old G Wagon, you know, I did not enjoy the way the old G Wagon drove.
We wouldn't call it a nimble dancer.
No, But the new one I did enjoy it, and so I put my order in. It took two years,
maybe I ordered it at the end of eighteen. I
finally got it in twenty twenty. And that's also the
only car new ore Us that I've ever made a profit on when I sold it.
Oh, no way, Yeah, so that buck the trend.
I mean I saved up for years to be fair, and when I did buy it, I paid I don't know, I think one thirty or one.
You actually made money on a new car purchase.
Yeah, I sold it like two years later with thirty thousand miles on it for one point fifty.
Dude, that's really good.
Yeah, wow, congrats, that's really really good.
Because I was going to say everything else I I bought my Raptor. I bought new kind of part of
my reporting because I was doing a story on building f fifties. Yeah, but that wasn't you know, a high
car that was affordable. At the time I bought my Raptor,
it was only fifty fifty eight thousand dollars sticker, and that was when it had the six point two liters V eight. That was when it was the really good Raptor.
Did you buy that or the g Wagon thinking that you were going to lose money? Yes, and you're okay
with that?
Yeah, I mean a car is a depreciating asset, like in my world right in not maybe not in your world because you guys have so much experience I know, but when you buy a car, you know you you already have been doing this for a long time, so you probably could sell one of the cars you've bought for more than what you paid. I'd like to think
so yeah, but I, you know, was just a normal person before and so stop. I always expect appreciation on
a vehicle.
Yeah, I think, I think, I mean, we all kind of should. Anyway. That's I was going to say, I just.
Sold my Challenger for a loss. You know, I think
I paid sixty four for it new and I sold it for fifty one.
There's a part of me that thinks, at one point we're talking like if we win a million dollars or join SpaceX's investor board, whatever, that new car smell, it's kind of cool.
What would you get?
Probably, honestly, if I was getting a new car, I would probably either get one of the SL sixty three's, Honestly, I would seriously consider that, or a nine nine to two turbos probably really yeah, Yeah, the SL sixty three I get, But the turbos I do not get.
I don't feel like, well I haven't actually I haven't driven.
Well, what I really want is the st but that's kind of in a different category.
Now, that's where I'm with you. That's why, that's where
I'm right.
All right, Well, now that's that's all. If I had
SpaceX money, one hundred thousand dollars car now.
Yeah, but you know it's going to appreciate right way.
That's like a nine to eleven R. You know, maybe
if I had that kind of if I had SpaceX money, I would definitely get an st Yes, if I could get the allocation, sure, because I wouldn't want to buy it flicking for a trailer. But yeah, what else do.
We have that?
Oh?
Can I can I do a venting thing?
Yes?
You have time for event and you can talk. Then
we'll we'll get to Jim Farley. Perfect. Here's my little
rant for the day, and you guys can weigh in on your pet peeves. Here's a pet peeve when somebody
parks way too close to the bumper of your classic Rolls Royce vehicle, when they have all the room in the world and they literally park, I would say, generously eight inches from your bumper. And it happens to be
a Tesla with a no elon license plate, which to me is the height of stupidity and virtue signaling. That
just really grinds my gears.
I have a real problem with the parking issue.
Who does that?
You know you're right?
Is it malicious or is it completely just not spatially aware.
It's malicious. It's it's weak on the part of the
person who does. I don't.
I don't get it. I couldn't get behind that car
to open my trunk if I needed to.
Not a good person.
I don't think it's a good person.
And then on top I don't in La, it's a very big deal to if you do have a Tusla, you got to have like an anti elon bumper sticker.
Now that I'm okay with that, I'm okay.
Why don't you just get a different car? If you're
driving a Tesla anyway you can afford it. It's not
like just get swap it out.
Like a Model three Performance or no, some random models. Okay,
So it's first of all, it's the best car. It's
the best Tesla.
It's the best good it's not there's.
A tireless design, it's elegant.
Get an e Tron.
And it's old. It's old. The person for one, the
person it's fair to say that the person new bottom Model S bought it before Elon Musk was defiably.
Unclear because this person owns two Teslas.
How do you know that?
Because they live in my neighborhood.
Oh my god, Okay.
I've been clocking this person. If I know who this
person is.
If you have to Tesla's, then the bumper sticker or the right. Dude, you can't just no longer disc.
You can't have no Eli license plate. You've been owning
Tesla's for years. Yeah, that's not This is just someone
who's trying to be what they think is cool. That's
not okay, Just get rid of the car, dude, I don't get it.
I agree, I agree, But the thing is like, if you're parking, I well, I'm of two minds because I think the Model S is a great a great vehicle and historically also.
Historically extremely significant.
And but I was gonna say, if you the Tesla, the Tesla driver doesn't care if you hit her bumper or his bumper, whereas the roles are voice driver does care care.
Very much, but also show some respect for an old rules. Seriously,
I'm with you. It's not about me.
It's about my car.
I'm one hundred percent with you on that, But I think it's okay for normal A normal person who bought a Model three before Elon Musk took up the chainsaw, it's fair for that person to say, I bought this car before I knew it was crazy.
I think.
I think Dan Neil actually wrote a column about that in the Wall Street Journal, remember that, like a year ago.
I love his writing.
Yeah, here's the other thing. And I don't actually know
if I myself live up to this standard that I'm going to say I hold other people to. But don't
you at least try to have a general idea about any big purchases, about who's behind what you're buying. The
car is probably your second biggest purchase in life for most people, So regardless of anything, you have a little idea about the philosophy behind the object that you spend money on.
I mean, I hear what you're sorry. I think before
like about two years ago, it became clear that Musk was like gonna run around with the chainsaw, had like thirteen children.
You know, Like, well, he's had thirteen children for about twenty years.
It just wasn't really out in the open that he was, so he's.
Been talking about Mars since day one.
Yeah, but that's cool. That's the cool part of Elon Musk.
The things that he's achieved for, you know, humanity are still like you can't debate that, right, Am I wrong?
Do you not think that's I'm not sure what your point is.
I think at the time the Model S came out, you could be proud to buy a Tesla. You know,
at the time the Model X came out, you could be proud to buy a Tesla that was still when you're sling, you.
Would have been proud to buy a Tesla. And no,
and no, And this is at the I'm just gonna tout my own self for a minute. I have spent
a lot of time with Elon before people knew he.
Was who he is now, And wasn't it cool?
He was a very nice person. He was very nice
to me at that point. Obviously, I'm a reporter, so
he's going to be on his best behavior and all this stuff. But even then, when I could have a
nice conversation with him, I would not have bought a Tesla.
Well that's because you're a car enthusiast.
I love that's my own thing.
Yes, I get it. I mean you are a big
fan of authentic quality and real materials, and it's not you.
It's just not me.
You bought like a nineteen seventy one Rolls Royce. That's
very different. That's the other end. You know who I
love spending time with and who is cool and I liked him as long as I've known him, so for fifteen Jim Farley. Yes, Jim Farley is a great guy.
Is that who we're gonna say?
Yeah, Yeah, it is.
He seems pretty authentic.
It's so cool what he's been able to do. Like
his I think his like grandfather worked at Ford and the first car that he bought and drove across country was a Mustang. And he worked very successfully at Lexus
for a long time, so for the competition before he came to run Ford. And it's just sweet that he
got them back to JD. Power's number one spot because
it's not something you can buy. It's not like car
of the Year for some mag that you know, we'll give it to you if you put enough ads in their book, Like you have to make better cars in order to achieve that.
Yeah, I want to put a qualifier in here and say it makes me uncomfortable to like speak in such glowing terms of any car executive because because of journalists but journalistic integrity. So I'm like not going to say
very much glowing about anybody, but I will agree with you, Matt that and obviously with a grain of assault, because he's he's incredibly smart, and he understands his audience and he understands who he's talking to, and so he plays to that of course, but you know, he can read the room. Anybody can. But my point is also he
is a little bit different when you're dealing with him in like in a straight interview for a story or a specific future or something, because unlike a lot of car other car executives, he doesn't speak in bullet points.
He he can articulate in a normal conversation, very high minded ideas in a normal manner, and he doesn't speak in pullet points and he doesn't have five pr people standing around him because he can't. He's unsure that he's
going to say the right or the wrong thing. He
is able to articulate exactly what he means like.
A well because it comes from the heart.
And yes, you know that is admirable.
You know he's not playing, he's not putting it on because when he talks about the importance of forward to him, it's a family matter. Yes, when if you're fronting, then
you're not going to be driving classic race cars because you could die.
I can't fake you cannot fake driving, and not just driving, you can't fake racing. And that is another distinguishing factor
for Jim Farley, And you're absolutely right.
About it, like important. I remember when I was talking
to him many years ago at the LA Auto Show about the g and it was incredibly important to him to build a car that would get around the track faster and as an than a portion nine to eleven and be a better experience. He he put the the
what do you call the flat plane crank in that car, knowing that it would be difficult, right because it shakes the engine so much and it's hard to keep it durable, but because he wanted that exotic experience, right, He's I'm sure been at least part of the driving force between keeping a manual transmission in the Mustang platform. When you
know the Camaro was canceled, the Challenger was canceled even before it was canceled. Yes, they had a manual transmission,
but they hardly made any of them. Like, he cares
about the product for you know, for enthusiasts, even though he's obviously running a business and here about that too, so he's like authentic, but also of course he's a CEO. Anyway,
listen to what he told me about winning jd Powers initial quality standards among all manufacturer, mainstream manufacturers. Let's take
it off, Jim. I mean, it is such an incredible feat.
Not only coming back from the slide that you were in to take number one the number one spot, I mean number two or number three would have been impressive, but beating Toyota, beating Honda, their legendary for quality. How
did you actually achieve that?
Well, it took us four years of hard work to be an overnight success story.
You know, it's been. It's been just an amazing culture change.
It for literally, Matt, every one of our engineers has been in the plant, every one of our supply chain teams are in our suppliers. We are paying attention to
every detail. It has taken a few years to get there,
but I think it's really about the culture of putting quality before profits before anything else. And that really is
what's exciting about this because now what I'm seeing is the team really focusing on learn tern durability.
So what was it your team? Was it an employee
of labor issue? Was it you know technology? Did you
use AI? Was it factory processes?
Like?
Can you get into specifics of how you did it?
Yeah?
If you if you were to visit today the Rouge plant where we make the F one fifty matt what you would see is a whole control center around data and quality data. So we measure the torque of every
one of our fasteners. We have AI tools for vision systems,
but most of all, it's just old fashioned hard work of our team members all working together to pay attention to the very small details that will make a difference between a perfectly built four and okay built Toyota. It's
just an incredible attention to every single detail.
So, I mean, it's interesting now that we're in the age of AI and we're talking about this technology killing jobs, but it seems like in your case, it's really experienced human workers that made the big difference it did.
I have to say the process coaches, the area coaches, you know, they get up every morning they look at the last shifts quality data. We look at how many
vehicles are repaired, and we work that process every moment of every day. Every employee walks into anyone on our plants,
they know exactly are we winning, are we losing yesterday and today? Everyone is fully aware of where we stand.
We know exactly where Toyota is, we know exactly how to you know where we need to get to beat Tundra and Super Duty better than any of the other domestic competitors. And so everyone is aware exactly the quality
is coming out of our plant in any particular shift every fifty seconds. And that is that human motivation to
pay attention to everyone. Everything is amazing. Look, we make
eighty five percent of our vehicles in the US, Matt.
That means these are US factory workers versus even our domestic competitors. They're some of the biggest importers in the US.
We're not building these vehicles in South Korea or Japan.
These are American workers beating Toyota and Hyundai and our domestics who import their vehicles. We beat them all with
the American workers, with the attention to detail, it's.
An incredibly compelling narrative. I agree, of course, being at Bloomberg,
we're focused on the numbers and quality issues. Recalls and
the like had dragged down profits and margins to some extent over the past few years. Can you quantify in
dollar terms how much this will contribute to to your recovery this year?
Hundreds of millions of improvement. We're seeing our warranty coverages
come down, We're seeing our costs come down. These are
all contributing to literally hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars of a tailwind for Ford on costs.
But we didn't stop there.
We also negotiated our parts costs with our suppliers. We've
looked at all of our bill material and even our manufacturing inventory and our plants and all our manufacturing logistics costs.
Imagine for Ford Pro it's the most important. You've got
incredible growth there, You've got double digit margins, You've got thirty percent subscription growth. Correct me if I'm wrong on
any of those numbers. How important is this for Ford
Pro and does it change the picture at all?
Well?
Good question, I would say for Ford Pro, really what this means Bill Ford tough really means something to our pro.
Customers on the vehicle side, But.
What we're really seeing there is an obsession with long term powertrained durability. We're testing every end two to three
hundred thousand miles with transmissions, axles, everything. So those pro
customers who use their vehicles literally ninety percent of the day to run their business, they can not only be happy with ninety day quality, but also five to ten year quality. That's what it means for our pro customers.
In the pro business. I'm really interested in the subscription
growth that you've seen. Can you give us targets there?
Are you looking at even stronger growth as that business grows.
We are seeing quarter over quarter, as you said, between thirty and forty percent growth. The margins are over eighty
percent on our growth margin side. Here's what people are buying.
They're buying productivity. These vehicles, you know they run their business. Plumbers, electricians,
ambulance police, you know these customers.
They use the date off the vehicles.
They teach the drivers how to be easier on the brakes, to accelerate better, not to go past the speed limit.
You know, did you tells and route the vehicles efficiently to their next job. All these productivity software tools that
we offer customers allows them to reduce their cost and improve their uptime so their vehicles never off the road.
We're now able to send them prognostics or predictive failure of vehicle components so that their vehicles are never off the road. They can do that predictive maintenance before problem happens,
and they absolutely We're approaching a million subscriptions now for pro.
So and at a time when we see you know, eight hundred billion dollars of hyperscaler capex this year alone to build out US infrastructure, tell us what kind of opportunity this is for Forden and how much you're able to participate in that in that data center build out.
Well, I have to say, in the old days we used to look at housing. Today what we look at
is construction. The construction trades are booming, super duty transit,
exportable power to the job site. This is what customers want.
They want new vehicles that are efficient with software. But
also what they want is storage batteries. We're now going
to be one of the biggest domestic makers of energy storage batteries.
Now we're scaling up that plant. We actually have two plants.
We'll have twenty giga want hours of energy storage and not only for sustainable grid and the grid reliance, but also Hyperscalers. They're going to use our battery electric storage
batteries to run to really run our country, help run our country. Between pro and best our energy storage business,
we're very well positioned.
Have you got.
Contracts with any of these big hyperscalers, Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Meta that you can tell us about.
Jim, Yeah, good question. Well, we're in the middle of
building out and converting these batteries from vehicle batteries to energy storage batteries, which are actually very different chemistry wise.
Format wide MATT.
To your point, we've had literally hundreds of customers now in the contracting phase. We announced one large one edf
and they've committed about five gig WAT hours over the course of several years now, and we're in the process of contracting many many customers.
It's a mixed MATT.
We see sustainable grid you know, Win and solar. We
also see hyperscalers building out. They want that one hundred
percent up time on their facility. The Ford batteries are
really useful for that, so it's a mix of customers so far.
If I mean, since we're on Bloomberg, you're talking to every single investor on the planet, so you can share financial information with us that's material. Is this the right
time to boost your EBIT target for the year.
A great question, because we're right about right about a quarter or two earnings.
I don't want to give a preview.
I would love to love to give everyone insight into where we're running, but I would say, you know, good solid progress at Ford in our base business but also our non vehicle business.
We're just seeing growth across the board.
Boy, I got to tell you, I love American consumers.
They absolutely love our Ford trucks. So you know, on
the sales side, you've seen two months of sales, very strong results so far. We got out of the escape business,
but still our sales are growing and actually I really believe June could be a breakthrough year a month for Ford sales, so we'll see how it ends.
I have to say that I love watching Max first stapp in and it's been frustrating in some races, but he's been incredible to watch. I'm rooting for you and
Hajar getting a podium was amazing. Can you confirm that
they're going to drive for you next year as well?
Well?
Max has I think Isaac were in good shape. Max
does have a specific in his contract around around the car being competitive, but I think you know he's world multiple world champion, as you said, Matt, he'll have the option to choose that what I'm most confident and it's a bit of a dilemma for us, but the FIA and the Formula One said that the Red Bull Ford powertrain was the most powerful powertrain in the paddock. Unfortunately,
that doesn't allow us to make as many changes as our competitors who are behind us. But I am really
proud of the four team that a brand new powertrain that all the competitors are struggling with. That we at
Ford were able to partner with Red Bull and give Max, multiple world champion, such a great powertrain, But we got to put.
The whole package together.
We got a big race coming up this weekend and we're going to do everything we can to give Max world championship caliber powertrain power unit, and then the rest of the team has to do the work. Boy, if
we give it to Max, he will definitely deliver. How
about some of those qualifying efforts this year.
He is just amazing.
He is amazing. And you know I was with you
and Lamal last year when you announced here coming back to the hyper Sport class in twenty twenty seven, will you get Max behind the wheel of that car?
Well, yeah, Max has been driving a Mercedes at the ring and you know, sure would be great to see him in a Ford. You know, look, we won four
years in a row. We're the first American company win Lamar.
We're the only Ford American company that had a chassis driver and an engine by an American company, Win Lamar.
We're still the only one, and we're going back next year to win. It would be great to have Max
in the Ford hypercar. You know, I'm going to have
to really put on my charm school act to get him in that car, though, I.
Think you can do it, Jim. I think you're you
can pull that one off. If anybody can, it's you,
all right. So that was Jim Farley talking about business,
talking about to some extent, talking about AI right because this has been a huge boon to them and a new unexpected tailwind to make batteries for data centers, and talking about racing, because he does really care about racing.
That's why we love him.
What do you got going on this weekend? Anything special? Anything?
Yes, I'm going to a bar mitzvah on Saturday.
And I've asked all lots.
Of Jewish thank you. I've asked my Jewish friends, like,
I've been told we should give cash in increments of eighteen.
I knew that the occasion. Yeah, that's so, this is
what I've learned. Yeah, it's amazing.
I knew that it was increments of some number.
Yes, So I'm actually really looking forward to that. I
know it's a big deal and I'm so happy for our friend Milo. And yeah, and then Sunday we have
this big like society journalism, Society press dinner at the Biltmore in La that a bunch of us are going to for the LA Bureau. Cool excited about that too.
I kind of like them.
They're like little trade They're not little, but they're they're trade dinners, you know, kind of like the Oscars, but for journalists. Yeah, so not as not as good fashion,
but no, it's still fun.
I love those those things. Yeah as well.
What about you?
Well, I'm gonna keep driving this aston Martin to totally assess how good it is.
Yees, research, more research is needed.
Uh, and we're I mean, it's possible that I have a baby, that my wife has a baby.
Wait what we're in the zone.
Yes, like could be today, tomorrow, Oh my god, it could be any day now. So the little Miller Tana
number three will be the gender A boy?
What?
Freddy? Wait? My first boy? What? Which? I don't know.
I'm not that excited about that part of it.
I come from a family of two girls, one boy.
Were the boys the youngest?
Oh?
Really, yeah, it's a really nice mix.
It's a really nice mix.
My girls are like the lights of my life.
My dad always said it was good he had the son laugh because the girls softened him up a bit, and then by the time you got to the sun, he was a good parent.
I hope that's true as well, because I'm the oldest of four boys.
Huh.
And I often doubt like the goodness of my soul, you know, I'm just like, we were all problematic, like borderline bad people, you know. And I just I feel
for my parents and I don't want any of that repeated.
So, oh, you got a good thing going.
So I'm glad that I have the girl, had the girls first. Yeah, because we can make a good one.
I can't I can't wait to meet Freddy. That does
it for this week's show. Remember to follow and subscribe
to Hot Pursuit on Apple, Spotify, and anywhere else you listen.
You can also send us your comments. Email us at
hot Pursuit at bloomberg dot.
Net, and check out Hannah's columns and stories on bloomberg dot com and the Bloomberg Business app. Go there for
car reviews, events and stories that you won't find anywhere else.
Find out all Bloomberg dot com, slash Pursuits, slash autos.
I'm Matt Miller and I'm Hannah Elliott.
We'll be back in your podcast feed again next week
About this episode
Ford’s quality turnaround takes center stage, with hosts pointing to JD Power’s initial quality survey and arguing the change is cultural—not just automation. They then zoom into Ford Pro’s subscription-driven growth, fleet predictive maintenance, and long-mile durability testing. Racing threads weave through the episode via Verstappen contract talk and a viral NASCAR incident involving Kevin Magnussen and Noah Gregson. The car segment shifts to Mercedes and Aston Martin ownership details—hybrid power, touchscreen frustrations, and convertible driving—before ending with Tesla’s social identity in Los Angeles.
Hannah and Matt compare notes about the Mercedes-AMG SL 63 S E Performance and the Aston Martin DB12 Volante, and Jim Farley talks about Ford's quality ratings as it works with "gray beards" and AI. Plus, a pet peeve about Tesla owners.
