Sticking With A Sure Thing
Part Fourteen: Reinvention
By 2005, it was clear to some that Ford's basic strategy needed updating, as did a few of it's key models, and these improvements. These updates would affect three core models: The Ford Ranger, Falcon Family, and Land Rover Defender. While the Ranger and Defender were both segregated and subdivided by market, and a symbol of the "Old Ford," the Falcon Family had been a staple of Ford's highly successful global strategy for over a decade in 2008, so it came as no surprise that with the launch of the Seventh Generation Falcon and the Second generation Territory, that Ford would attempt to sell it in a new market: Europe.
The New Falcon and Territory, starting off with the initial FG specification would be sold in it's existing body styles of Sedan, Wagon, Sport Utility, and Ute in most every market, and as usual under a variety of names. The Engine selection would be more varied to match the diverse market tastes as well. In Europe the Falcon and Territory's base engines would be the B5244S I5 and DW12, while the rest of the world would have the revised Barra 195 and Lion 2.7 as the base engines. Otherwise the engine selection for the Falcon Family was the same across the planet, with the traditional Turbocharged Straight Six, V8, and Hybrid options being available in every market.
After it's introduction in europe the Falcon and Territory sold fairly well, if significantly less then expected, and it failed to gain a decent enough foothold in the market, and in fact, Ford sold more Falcons in the GCC then it did in all of Western and Central Europe, while Eastern Europe was a different story altogether, as between the FSB, various Oligarchs, and even a couple of Chechen warlords, sales of the Falcon in Russia alone topped those of the rest of Europe combined.
Debuting in 2009, the New Land Rover Defender was a massive redesign, and was a display of Ford's engineering Talent, and shared components, including most of it's engines, transmissions, and just about everything save it's body work and suspension system with the new truly Global Ranger (and the argument could be made that the Current Ranger is nothing more then a cheapened version of the Defender, with four wheel drive being only optional.) Both the Defender and Ranger came in a number of Body-styles, and had a number of engines and transmissions, including the Duratorq 2.2, and Lion 2.7 Turbo Diesels, along with the venerable Duratec 23, and the new Barra 195, all of which were mated with a number of automatic and manual transmissions. Both the Defender and Ranger sold excellently, and were massive successes, in what was easily one of the most competitive sectors of the industry.
And, what would the Ranger be without Hybrid and Plug in models? Ford introduced both an updated version of it's Hybrid system, as used on the FG Falcon, a new Ranger EV (The EV3,) and a decently engineered Plug in version, the Ranger Direct Charge 2 (The DC2,) featuring a new version of the 1.6l Duratec Ti-VCT, four cylinder. As usual, the Hybrid vastly outsold the EV3 and DC2, by a factor of nearly 50:1 on the EV3 and only 15:1 on the DC2. Regardless, Ford could still sell the massive number of CAFE vouchers that practically paid for the development of their Hybrid systems.
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It's been 9 months and 13 days (or just 286 days) since I last updated this TL, and just about 4,011 Hours and 27 minutes since I said I'd have an update soon. I think I just set a record for longest "I'll update this soon"
Ever. Update 15 should hopefully come by the end of the year, or more likely, the Presidential Election, and maybe I'll finish this TL before the end of the decade.