Ford restarts electric pickup truck factory after retooling to increase output, says orders are up

abcnews.go.com:

Ford is resuming production of the F-150 Lightning electric pickup after closing a factory in Dearborn, Michigan, for six weeks to triple production capacity

DETROIT — Ford is resuming production of the F-150 Lightning electric pickup after closing a factory in Dearborn, Michigan, for six weeks to triple production capacity.

The move comes just two weeks after the company cut prices on all versions of the trucks, some by as much as $10,000, fueling speculation that demand had fallen.

But company officials said Tuesday that they're getting six times the orders now than before the price cuts, and Ford has an order bank big enough to take up 45 days of production at the reworked Rouge Electric Vehicle Center. The company wouldn't give an exact number of orders.

Lightning sales in the second quarter of the year were more than double the same period in 2022, but there were up only 4% from the first quarter.

Ford says that's because they stopped production at the Rouge Electric Vehicle center in June to add equipment and expand the plant so it can make more vehicles. The plant, which now employs about 2,000 workers, will be able to produce electric trucks at a rate of 150,000 per year starting this fall.

Two weeks ago, Ford slashed prices on the electric trucks by thousands of dollars across the board in anticipation of increased factory output, falling costs for battery raw materials and internal efforts to scale production.

The price cuts across the Lightning line, some as deep as $10,000, were seen on on Wall Street as more evidence of a coming price war among electrical vehicle makers.

The cuts also were announced two days after Tesla said its first production Cybertruck electric pickup had rolled off the assembly line,