‘Normal Level’ of Chips Supply Not Possible Before 2022: Ford CEO

Amid the continuing low supply of chips and mounting vehicle order backlogs, “I don't know when we'll get to normal,” Ford CEO Jim Farley told a Deutsche Bank investors conference virtually Thursday. Ford has “like two years” of order backlogs on the Bronco SUV, and for the Mustang Mach-E electric vehicle, it’s “months and months and months around the world,” he said. The status is the same for the F-150 Lightning electric truck, “so I think it's going to be a while” for normalcy to return, he said. “We've talked to all the foundries. We've talked to all of the semi manufacturers.” Ford and the industry will need “to handle our supply chain differently for these key electronic components,” because they make up more than half of automakers’ bill of materials, he said. “This is a huge opportunity to learn how to manage the supply chain differently” than protecting against “a black swan weather event,” he said. “We're getting a couple of weeks’ visibility” into chips supply, said Harley. The discussions with the chipmakers “have been very insightful,” he said. “I would say, in the second half of the year, things are definitely going to get better for us.” Chips availability is “a very fluid situation,” he said. “We are learning that this is a scramble to get the modules in the vehicles,” even by second half, he said. “You're looking at 2022 -- sometime during 2022 -- before we'll get to a normal level of availability.”