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Ford, General Motors and automakers are slowing their investments in electric cars and doubling down on more successful gasoline-powered cars and trucks.
By Neal E. Boudette
For much of the past five years, automakers have spent billions in a mad dash to expand electric cars and build factories to produce them, hoping that consumers would flock to those new models.
But over the past 12 months, the growth rate of EV sales has slowed sharply as some car buyers have balked at the high prices of electric vehicles and trucks and the difficulties in charging them on long trips.
The change in customer sentiment is now forcing many automakers to abandon competitive investment plans and return, at least in part, to internal combustion engine cars, which still account for the majority of new car sales and a percentage of corporate profits.
The latest example came on Thursday when Ford Motor announced it would remodel a factory in Canada to produce pickup trucks larger than the electric-application vehicles it had previously planned to make there.
Ford’s move comes a day after General Motors said it planned to make between 200,000 and 250,000 battery-powered cars and trucks this year, about 50,000 fewer than it had planned in the past.
“After the pandemic, there’s massive exuberance around EVs, and I think a lot of brands think the expansion will continue,” said Arun Kumar, spouse and managing director of the automotive and commercial sector at AlixPartners. a consulting company. farm. ” But the truth is that’s not the case, and it’s a smart move to make sure you don’t lose market share in internal combustion. “
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