Ford Motor is set into a couple of different divisions, not counting sales companies, the major areas are Ford of the Americas, Ford of Europe, Ford Australia, and Ford Asia Pacific (however the last to are showing signs of becoming one, we still think of them as seperate). The majority of engineering and R&D occurs in Europe and in the USA, vehicles for other markets, i.e. China etc are still engineered in Europe, however manufacturing is obviously in the market where it is sold.
Ford overall is obviously a US brand and we always have to conform to what they want, no matter how profitable and stable FoE is, Ford NA will always have the last say.
A LOT of engineering resources are shared between the US and Europe, (i.e. they do engineer things for us and vice versa). Over the past 5 years, quite a few of our cheif designers have gone to FNA (i.e. J Mays, Peter Horbury etc), and our expertise on the European market is used extensively in their new products. I.E. the chap who headed the chassis and handling of the mondeo and focus, went over to help on the mustang, he also helped with astons etc.
The new ethos is to now share everything ('One Ford'...they call it
), create vehicles to be sold globally as one, so in about 10 years time you couldnt really say 'thats an american ford' etc. I'm not sure how this will hold in Ford Australia as they seem to be quite a seperate market to the US and Europe, however they do use a lot of our cars and the Mondeo has just been relaunched there.
The only thing which is happening now which worries me is the European cars going to the US market, it worries me in the fact of the strain which will be put on FoE on this transition as it isnt a simple case of just handing them blueprints.
I hope that cleared up some stuff, if you have any questions let me know.
