JANUARY 11, 2002

Ford to announce big cuts today

THE FORD MOTOR COMPANY is to announce today that it is to reduce its global production capacity by one million units. This will mean the closure of four or five of its North American factories and the loss of about 10% of the company workforce. The cuts come in the face of mounting losses for the Detroit giant - which is represented in Formula 1 by Jaguar Racing. The latest cuts will be in addition to the 4000 jobs already slashed last year.

All three of the big US automobile giants: Ford, General Motors and DaimlerChrysler are cutting jobs at the moment but of the three only General Motors is making a profit.

It is widely believed that the latest cuts are only the start of an even more ruthless pruning which some analysts feel could wipe out 30,000 more jobs.

But as Ford suffers GM is doing better than expected with the company announcing better than expected figures and, perhaps more significantly, registering its first gain in market share in the US for over 10 years. The company's chief executive Richard Wagoner is continuing to look at ways of increasing GM's market share around the world. Having worked for GM in Europe and in Latin America he has much more international attitude than many of his predecessors.