Autoblog

The Ford Bold Moves web-based documentary reaches lucky number 13 today and focuses it's power over audio and video on the upcoming Ford Edge. "This launch is absolutely crucial," says Mark Fields in the episode, and we couldn't agree with him more. I say as much in an accompanying piece on the website you can read right here. With the Accelerated Way Forward plan now on the table, the stakes are even greater for a good launch of the Edge. By the time Mark Fields stands before us at the 2007 Detroit Auto Show in January we'll find out whether or not Ford's been successful and if the Edge is resonating with consumers. For Ford's sake, we wish 'em luck.

[Source: Ford Bold Moves]

Thanks to a fax sent by the United Auto Workers union to its leaders in various regions, we now know that Ford will be extending its job buyout offer to all 75,000 of its hourly UAW workers. This means that Ford is more than doubling the Way Forward plan's initial offer to buy out 30,000 of its 82,000-person work force. According to the New York Times, only 6,200 workers accepted the offer the first time around, though we expect Ford is hoping its new offer is as successful as the one General Motors made that resulted in the voluntary attrition of some 35,000 workers.

We'll have details of the buyout offer tomorrow morning, but expect it to be chock full of incentives for workers to consider leaving the company.

[Source: The New York Times]

Episode 12 of the Ford Bold Moves web-based documentary is live online and it focuses on Ford's history in racing. One interesting fact it reveals is that Ford Racing celebrated its 100th anniversary 18th months prior to Ford Motor Company's big centennial blow out, because in 1901 Henry Ford beat Alexander Winton in a race held at a Grosse Pointe racetrack. Ford sold the car he used, the trophy he won and solicited some venture capitalists in the stands that day to start Ford Motor Company.

The main message of Episode 12 as it pertains to racing is that Ford doesn't plan on leaving the track anytime soon. Not only does racing offer opportunities for trickle down technology in the areas of performance and safety, but is there any better marketing for Ford than seeing a Blue Oval cross a checkered line?

[Source: Ford Bold Moves]

If you're a video game freak and a Mustang fan, chances are you're going to pick up Ford Bold Moves: Street Racing for the PS2, XBox 360 or PC no matter what kind of reviews it gets. Manufacturer specific driving games are not a new thing, even for Ford who is now on its third version of the Ford Racing series. Still, they can often devolve into extended digital test drives when there's only one brand to race.

Perhaps Ford Bold Moves: Street Racing is a cut above the rest, as it has some interesting features beyond the obvious draw of driving 18 of the greatest Ford vehicles of all time (see complete list of available vehicles after the jump). Gameplay is structured around short challenges, competitions and league play that takes place on 24 tracks based on the streets of L.A. Why video game makers insist on having us race the streets of the most congested city in the U.S. is beyond us, but we digress. In addition to winning cash to modify your Ford of choice, the game also goes the extra step to simulate real damage. The real hook, however, is a Maximum Team Control Racing mode in which players can control a team of up to three cars at once and can switch which car they're controlling on the fly.

With a name like Ford Bold Moves, we were hoping there'd be a management mode where we could swap out CEOs, bargain with teamsters and close plants, but it looks like game developer Razorworks is saving those features for its follow up, The Way Forward: Turnaround Xtreem.

[Source: Ford]

The Ford Bold Moves web-based documentary has already reached its 11th episode and finally addresses the bread and butter of FoMoCo: its F-Series trucks. After leading the full-size truck market in the U.S. for 29 years, Ford makes it apparent that it wants the F-Series to stay King of the Hill. Since the F-Series was just redesigned, the episode doesn't address in great detail how Ford plans to achieve that, except for a brief mention of the upcoming clean diesel engine. Nevertheless, its worth a watch if only to see Mark Fields' visit to Texas where he scouts out the new Toyota truck plant being built in San Antonio. The footage of the construction crew's Super Duty trucks on site is priceless and pure marketing gold.

Our own resident truck guru, Eric Bryant, was also tapped to pen an article entitled The Pickup: As American as Apple Pie for the episode.

[Source: Ford Bold Moves]

Ford's Bold Moves campaign just got a little bolder with the introduction of Ford Bold Moves Street Racing, a video game developed in cooperation with Eidos Interactive. Scheduled to hit a North American PlayStation 2, XBOX or PC near you this fall, the game comes packing 18 Ford vehicles and the option to switch among three of them at a time during a race, thanks to a function known as "Maximum Team Control." The game also allows the ability to crash and boom 'til your heart's content via the "progressive damage system" function, which, like most video games on the market, shows the damage done to your vehicle as you play.

Among the vehicles to choose from in the game are the 1968 Mustang GT, 1969 Mustang Boss 302, 1985 RS200, 1987 Sierra RS500, 1995 GT90 Concept, 2000 Ford SVT Cobra R, 2004 SVT F-150 Lightning, 2006 Ford GT, and 2007 Shelby GT500.

Our friends over at Joystiq aren't exactly enamored by the fact that the promotional-type game will be sold retail, unlike a game put out last fall by Volvo that was free to prospective buyers and showcased the safety features championed by the brand. We say that if other car manufacturers can spend millions of dollars ensuring that their vehicles end up in Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition and Gran Turismo 4, Ford can spend millions of dollars playing in their own sandbox -- it's the quality of the game that counts.

[Source: Ford Motor Company via Joystiq]

The sixth webisode of the FordBoldMoves documentary begins with a statement of fact: "Ford has the worst fuel efficiency of any automaker in America." That's what we like about these little shorts – they can be brutally honest about the condition of Ford, even if they do tend to end with a hope-springs-eternal attitude. The sixth webisode speaks to Ford's past failure and current efforts to become a greener automaker. Examples such as the Hybrid Escape taxi fleet in New York and the upcoming introduction of the first hydrogen internal combustion engine shuttle buses later are used to show the Blue Oval is working on the problem. But, as many have noted before us, Ford planned for a gas-guzzling economy with its heavy investment in trucks and SUVs over the past twenty years, and now that consumer taste is shifting Ford needs to shift with it.

No doubt many who watch Episode 6 will focus on the clay model that's briefly displayed on screen in between shots of the Shelby GR-1.

Also, don't forget to check out a Counterpoint article by AutoblogGreen editor Sebastian Blanco in which he argues that Ford's future will be found in a hydrogen economy.

[Source: FordBoldMoves]

The third installment of Ford's ambitious Bold Moves documentary series kicks off a three-part arc focused on the new GT500 . Fittingly, Part 1 centers on the man for which that car is named: Carroll Shelby. Chock full of great archival footage, the webisode begins with Carroll telling viewers in his own words how his relationship with Ford came to be. He approached then-president Lee Iacocca with the proposition that if Iacocca gave him $25,000, he'd build Ford a car that would go out and beat the Corvette. In one of the better moves ever made by an automobile industry executive, Iacocca ponied up the $25K. The rest, as you know, is history.

The episode goes on to show Ford's emergence in the musclecar arena, then takes viewers through the decline of performance in the fuel-strapped 70s to the design and product wasteland of the 80s, finally bringing the story full circle with Carroll's return to Ford a few years ago. Carroll Shelby's one of those people who you can watch and listen to for hours on end. You only get a couple of minutes with him in Bold Moves episode 3, but it's time very well spent.

Autoblog's fearless leader, John Neff, gets into the act himself as the scribe of the "Point" essay in the Point/Counterpoint feature on the site. In it, he makes a compelling case as to why halo cars like the new Shelby GT500 are important to automakers.

Your assignments, Autoblog readers, are the following: Watch the webisode. Read the essay. Weigh in with your own opinions in the comments.

Now get going!

Half Real World, half late-night SPEED channel documentary, Ford's Bold Moves campaign is onto its second episode, Commitment to Design. Ford design gurus J Mays, Peter Horbury and Hau Thai-Tang chime in to accept responsibility for bringing Ford back from the abyss via design. The episode hones in on vehicles such as the Ford Iosis, Superchief truck and Shelby GR-1 to show how Ford is going after bold flavors of design and not vanilla to get its "design mojo back," as Mark Fields says in the episode.

As a bonus, check out an article on the site by our very own John Neff, "The Inside Story: Why A Car's Interior Design Matters More Than Ever" -- you can even vote for our fearless leader's contribution by logging into the Bold Moves site.

[Source: FordBoldMoves.com]

Tuesday marks the launch of Ford Motor's "Bold Moves: The Future of Ford" online documentary series, which shows you "the inner workings of the automaker as it rebuilds its business in North America."

Ford plans a new episode every week through the rest of the year, starting with the series kick-off piece "Change or Die," described by Ford as "a probing look at the state of the auto industry and Ford's business in North America."

The mini-episodes are only three to five minutes long, but Ford promises to show us places the public has never seen before, including Ford exec's offices, design studios and assembly plants. They'll be a new episode every week throughout the remainder of 2006, according to Ford.

Stars of upcoming episodes include Peter Horbury, North America design chief, and Ford icon Carroll Shelby. The site also includes editorial written by automotive journalists such as Peter DeLorenzo, Mike Millikin (the founder of Green Car Congress) and Autoblog's own John Neff. Our fearless leader's musings will accompany a future episode on the site, so we'll let you know when it goes live.

Tune in at www.fordboldmoves.com.

[Source: Ford]