By the impact of the epidemic, as far away as India, as Jaguar Land Rover's parent company, Tata Motors is not having a good time, which recently said it plans to spin off its passenger car business from its trucks and public ****ing cars business as a separate division within the company. The move is aimed at driving the company's focus on its two main businesses, passenger cars and commercial vehicles. In a statement, Tata Motors said the spin-off of the passenger car business will help it gain access to strategic alliances, which will provide the company with new products, auto components, technology, and capital.
Performance due to the slowdown in economic growth, as of February, India's auto sales have fallen for 16 consecutive months; but for the moment, the epidemic factor caused by the shutdown of production to the car companies to bring more impact and challenges. It is reported that, in order to prevent and control the epidemic, the Indian government in the national implementation of 21 days of confinement, the current scope of India's automobile factories have been shut down, and Tata has also announced that, out of concern for the epidemic, India's western Maharashtra automobile factory operating activities in the scale of the drastic reduction.
A few days ago, Moody's Investors Service put Tata Motors' credit rating on its watch list for a downgrade and concluded that the company is in dire need of cash flow to revive sales. For his part, Chetai, Managing Director of Asia Automotive Intelligence, pointed out, "Spinning off passenger cars is something that Tata Motors should have done years ago. I think the fundamental challenge for Tata in the current environment will be bigger than restructuring."
The current domestic epidemic in the U.S. is very serious, as of March 30, Beijing time, the U.S. cumulative cases have exceeded 140,000, of which the most serious state of New York is as high as nearly 60,000 cases, which can not help but feel sorry. The shortage of respirators and other medical equipment brought about by the epidemic is serious, and now U.S. industrial giants Boeing, Ford, General Motors and others will be "forced" to join the production of the aforementioned equipment in the ranks of ......
Local time on the 28th, Trump was sent off in the Trump spoke at the farewell of the Navy hospital ship "Comfort" to New York to support the fight against the epidemic: "This week, I invoked the 'National Defense Production Act' to force General Motors to fulfill the federal contract (for the production of) respirators. " Trump said, "In the next 100 days, the United States will make or acquire as many as three times as many respirators as we (normally) (make or acquire) in an entire year. We are well prepared." U.S. automakers, represented by Ford and General Motors, have factory floors as well as production lines that are being converted to make respirators, protective masks, face shields and other vital equipment.
As Ford revamps its production lines, it has also announced its plans to restart production as early as April 6 at a number of assembly plants in North America. Those plants make lucrative SUVs, pickups and commercial trucks, such as the F-Series pickup, which has been the nation's best-selling model, and Ford clearly doesn't want to delay production and sales of those important models too much.
Galhotra, Ford's North American president, said the plants will take tight safety measures to protect returning workers from the new coronavirus outbreak. According to the announcement, Ford plans to reopen a plant in Mexico on April 6 that builds the Ford Fusion (Mondeo) and Lincoln MKZ sedans, and will resume work at four more pickup, SUV and commercial truck plants on April 14 in the U.S. states of Michigan, Kentucky, Missouri and Ohio.
The epidemic has also brought financial problems, and Ford has decided to delay some payroll. According to foreign media reports, Ford executive chairman Bill?Ford's full salary will be deferred, while Ford CEO Jim?Hackett, COO Jim?Farley, and CFO Tim?Stone will be delayed by 50 percent to further save money during the epidemic .
On March 20, Ford announced that it would activate $13.4 billion (about $95 billion) including under the Ford Motor Company line of credit and $2 billion (about $14.1 billion) under the Ford Motor Credit Company line of credit. These new cash additions will be used primarily to offset the temporary working capital impact of production shutdowns due to the new Crown Pneumonia outbreak. In addition, Ford has partnered with 3M and GE?Healthcare to help boost production of much-needed medical supplies, including masks, motorized air breathing apparatus and ventilators, among other medical equipment.
This article comes from the authors of the Motorhome Car Family, and does not represent the views of Motorhome's position.