Ford opens itself up to investors on driverless car tech

The chief executive of Ford Motors has said the company is open to discussions with rival firms and investors on funding its self-driving technology unit, but played down ongoing talks with Volkswagen about a potential deal.

Ford and Volkswagen have previously acknowledged that they are in talks on a partnership, however Ford boss Jim Hackett said today the deal is a “delicate dance”.

The supervisory board of Volkswagen is scheduled to meet next week to review its company strategy for the next decade, which is expected to include debate on forging alliances with rivals to fund research and development in new areas such as electric and autonomous vehicles.

Hackett told Reuters that the partnership was “going better than we thought it would”, although downplayed ideas of expanding into other areas such as electric cars.

Bryan Salesky, the chief executive of self-driving car startup Argo AI in which Ford owns a majority stake, told the Financial Times today that the firm is in talks with multiple rival carmakers to gain “billions of dollars” in investment.

He did not confirm whether one of those companies is Volkswagen, despite Hackett’s comments.

Ford invested $1bn (£782m) into Argo AI in February this year, however Salesky said the same amount again would be “not enough” to keep going.

Ford and Argo are currently testing their driverless vehicles in four US cities, with plans to expand this number next year. The company expects to launch self-driving vehicles for sale to consumers by 2021.

The company also plans to expand into trialling its designs for vehicles in other areas, such as food delivery, laundry or flowers.

Sherif Marakby, chief of Ford’s own autonomous car unit, said the company will work with Walmart to design automated delivery services, adding: “We see equal opportunity between moving people and moving goods.”

The move comes after other rival motor firms ramped up funding goals for their self-driving units, including General Motors which has secured more than $5bn in investment from Softbank and Honda to develop a robot taxi service.

General Motors last month launched a cost-cutting programme to that effect, offering buyouts to 18,000 US salaried staff.