eBusiness Weekly
A century ago Henry Ford came to Brazil and established the town of Fordlandia, hoping to become an Amazonian rubber baron, but retreated deep in the red.
Now the automaker he founded is once again licking its Brazilian wounds, having abandoned production in the challenging market after burning through roughly 61 billion reais (US $11,6 billion) in the past decade.
Ford Motor Co (F.N) announced the closure of its manufacturing plants in January, dealing a heavy blow to its more than 5 000 workers in the country and almost 300 dealerships.
Previously unreported corporate filings show the scale of the financial woes that led to the decision. Ford had burned through US $7,8 billion, the bulk in accumulated losses but also some cash injections, according to the documents filed in Sao Paulo state, where the automaker is registered in Brazil.
Add to that the US $4,1 billion that Ford will shell out to extricate itself from its commitments, and the price tag for the Brazilian operation rises to almost US $12 billion.
Almost all the losses and cash injections were in the past eight years, when the company has lost about US $2 000 for every car it sold, Reuters calculations based on the filings and sales data indicate.
Ford, which does not separate out Brazil from South America in its financial results, declined to comment on the losses, cash injections and calculations.
The expensive retreat of the US. heavyweight underlines the risks for global automakers in Brazil, a country seen not long ago as one of the most promising growth markets in the world, but where tax, labour and logistics costs are high.
The Covid-19 pandemic has strained finances while Ford’s problems also reflect, in part, a strategic misstep that saw it lag rivals in transforming its line-up of unprofitable compact cars into higher-margin SUVs, according to half a dozen sources familiar with the company’s Brazilian operation.
Ford had in fact drafted a plan to shift into SUVs, larger cars with higher profit margins, but was too slow to implement it, they said.
“There were no other viable options,” Lyle Watters, Ford’s head for South America, told Reuters in a statement about the decision to exit the country.
Watters, who will start a new Ford role in China in July, cited an “unfavourable economic environment, lower vehicle demand (and) higher industry idle capacity” for the Brazil retreat.
He declined to comment on the SUV project, saying he would not “speculate on new product plans.”
A Ford spokesman in Brazil said the company was implementing “a lean and asset-light business model in the region, with a truly customer-centric mindset”.
BRAZIL VS MEXICO
Brazil is largely a loss-maker for global car companies, despite the government providing federal subsidies totalling $8 billion over the past decade and a 35 percent import tariff to shield local production.
Domestic costs are high. Even though local factories can make 5 million cars a year, more than double the number sold in the country, exports are minimal because prices are uncompetitive. And it costs automakers money to keep factories open while operating at low capacity.
Mexico, by contrast, exports more than 80 percent of the cars it makes, helped by free-trade agreements with the United States and Canada, making it an attractive alternative for the same carmakers that already operate in Brazil.
A 2019 study by consultant PwC found that selling a Mexican-made car in Brazil was 12 percent cheaper for an automaker than selling a locally-made vehicle, including production, tax and logistics costs.
The study was commissioned by Brazilian auto industry group Anfavea, which is lobbying the government to reduce taxes and labour costs.
The high Brazilian costs mean even carmakers who pivoted earlier than Ford to higher-margin SUVs, like the Brazilian units of players like Volkswagen AG (VOWG_p.DE), General Motors Co (GM.N) and Toyota Motors Corp (7203.T), are struggling to stay in the black.
Volkswagen Brazil has lost US $3,7 billion since 2011, according to the corporate filings in Sao Paulo state. GM Brazil has received US $2,2 billion in cash injections since 2016, and Toyota Brazil last year required forgiveness on US $1 billion of inter-company debt, the documents showed.
Volkswagen, GM and Toyota all declined to comment on the filings figures.
The Brazilian economy ministry did not respond to a request for comment about the Ford exit and problems faced by the auto sector.
PROSPECTS PLUMMET
Ford failed to develop a viable production business in Brazil despite a practice of pursuing tax subsidies, which totalled more than that of its rivals over the past decade.
Since 2011, Ford has reaped about $2,6 billion in tax subsidies, or a third of all federal automotive incentives distributed in that period, according to Reuters calculations based on official tax forfeiture figures.
Ford declined to comment on its tax benefits.
In 2013, however, the business outlook began to change, as commodities prices crashed and dragged the local currency with it, sending Brazil into a deep recession made worse by corruption scandals. At the time, it was the world’s fourth largest auto market. It now ranks seventh.
Weak domestic demand and the uncompetitive exports pushed Ford to quintuple its bulk fleet sales between 2011 and 2019, and deepen the discounts to 30 percent or more, a person familiar with the pricing said.
Ford headquarters in Dearborn, Michigan, shored up its Brazilian subsidiary with US $1,3 billion in cash injections, in nine transfers between March 2018 and January 2021, according to the Sao Paulo corporate filings.
By late 2019, Ford was considering the key strategic shift to manufacture SUVs in Brazil and had three models planned, according to three of the sources familiar with the operation.
Yet many of its competitors had already been revamping their line-up to produce such vehicles for about two years.
“The truth is, Ford failed to modernise its product line-up at the same speed as its rivals,” said Ricardo Bacellar, automotive head at KPMG’s consulting arm in Brazil.
In the end, the SUV plans never came to fruition.
By April 2020, the economic pain wrought by the pandemic forced Ford to re-evaluate its plans for Brazil, the automaker has said.
Still, Ford made commitments to the government as late as November last year to invest more in Brazil and told its dealers in December that it expected improved sales in 2021, according to a government announcement and the dealers’ association.
Yet just weeks later, it halted production.
It closed its three plants, the largest one in Camaçari, in the northeastern state of Bahia.
It retains only a small operation selling imports, a niche market for high-end cars that the import tariffs make prohibitively expensive for many people.
Ford’s all-electric Mustang Mach 1, for example, which starts at US $53 000 in the United States, will sell for US $94,000 in Brazil, where per capita income is much lower.
While Ford sold 18 000 cars in Brazil in April 2019, it sold 1 500 cars in the same month this year. —Reuters
