C.A.R.S. Management Briefing Seminar - Day 3 Report
 |
Detroit Bureau
The Auto Channel
“We are in a knowledge explosion,” said David Cole, “running a marathon at a sprinters pace.” The charming and knowledgeable Mr. Cole runs the show here at the Management Briefing Seminars in Traverse City, the premier auto industry conference of the year. Attendance is about 1300 engineers, business leaders, software developers, politicians, journalists, parts and service suppliers . . . everyone interested in the business of making cars and light trucks.
Speaking of politicians our first talk today is by the dynamic Jennifer Granholm, easily the best-looking governor in the country, Michigan’s governor. She is facing reelection to a second term in a tight race against her Republican opponent, businessman Dick DeVoss of Grand Rapids. She desperately needs some positive news. She opens with her claim to be a “doom slayer, not a doom sayer.” She confidently tells the audience that if anyone is considering locating a facility of any kind in Michigan to come to her and her economic development staff and “We’ll make you a deal you can’t refuse.” She goes on to taut a list of successes in the past year in getting businesses to locate here.
The charismatic governor announced that her team and the struggling Ford Motor Company have just inked a deal to that will have Ford investing $1-billion within the state over the next 20 years to save 13,000 Michigan jobs. The deal will cost the State $151-million in tax breaks but generate 4.2-billion in tax revenue over that period of time. Those jobs will mean $63-billion in personal income.
Mark Fields, Ford’s executive VP and President of the Americas, whiz kid who saved Mazda, defended and offered an optimistic and enthusiastic assessment of Ford’s “Way Forward” plan, which has come under criticism for its lack of progress. He said that the plan has not changed except that the time table has been moved up. Field’s philosophy at Mazda and now at Ford is “Change or Die.”
“The rate of Ford’s loss of market share is slowing,” Fields offered confidently. Lots of new Ford products are coming based on their assessment of the future of the market. Crossovers will be strong as will small cars and small, premium sport-utilities. Trucks while considerably down this year, will hold steady at this year’s level. Residuals on Fusion, Expedition and Navigator are going up. JD Power quality assessment shows Ford now better than average – and, of course now, average is very good – allowing for a stronger warranty. “Ford will be profitable in 2008,” Fields promises.
Cars have become just a bunch of computers held together by hunks of steel, plastic and rubber. Dozens of computers small and smaller do just about everything within your car today and I think about two-thirds of the attendees here, certainly that many of the vendor booths, are purveyors of digital systems of one kind or another. Rob Pait, former radio personality and now marketing guy for Seagate Technology, gave me a virtual tour of their system for integrating your home computer and entertainment systems into your car. Amazing!
The navigation screen becomes essentially a computer desktop with icons that connect you to home through either cell towers or wireless systems. Say, for example, your errant teenager slaps himself on the forehead as you’re dropping him off at school and says “Bummer! I forgot my homework.” (Do kid’s still say “Bummer?”) Well, just connect to your home computer, find that book report he forgot, lift the center console and download the lad’s book report onto his portable drive though the USP port mounted there. Or, access all your digitized music, video or other content from your home systems. I’m impressed. Business folks are going to love this, too, since it will allow them to have direct access to the office computer.
Bill Hampton, publisher of AutoBeat daily AutoTech daily, offered an assessment of the supplier market. He sees the US market looking more like the European market, that is, fewer manufacturers with a steadier share of the business. In spite of the troubled suppliers like Delphi and Visteon, many suppliers are doing very well but we don’t hear about them so much. No one will go bankrupt he assures.
All work and no play, as we know, makes engineers, business moguls and pundits even more dull than they already are, so the entertainment last evening was singer/comedian/actor, Jeff Daniels, who performed on a stage in the 5th fairway of the resorts golf course where the thousands of us had diner. The sun set and the full moon rose while we drank, dinned and schmoozed. Then, for those with a bit of energy left a Motown band kept us going for another couple of hours.
More fun tomorrow when GM boss, Rick Wagoner will be the hot speaker. Stay tuned.