Ford postpones launch of Explorer EV in Europe

Ford is postponing the European market launch of the Explorer, its first all-electric volume model in the region, by about six months.

Instead of arriving in showrooms at the beginning of next year, the compact SUV is now scheduled to roll out in the summer of 2024.

Ford cited new European standards for batteries as the reason for the delay.

"Ford supports the upcoming European standard for electric vehicles because it is in line with our internal philosophy of delivering high-quality and safe vehicles to our customers worldwide. This means that the new Explorer will now be delivered to customers from summer 2024," a Ford spokesperson told Automotive News Europe sister publication Automobilwoche.

However, the upcoming standard "100.3/ ECE-R 100.3" has been known in the industry for a long time. Industry insiders suspect that the delays in the Explorer have another reason.

The reason could be the fact that the development of new electric vehicles at Ford in Europe and North America is not synchronized.

Ford is electrifying in Europe faster than in the U.S. The automaker has said its passenger lineup in Europe will become all-electric by 2030, five years ahead of the European Union's deadline to ban new combustion-engine cars from sale.

To get new mass-market BEVs quickly on the European market, Ford is using Volkswagen Group's MEB platform that underpins the VW ID4 for the Explorer and for a similar coupe-styled SUV that will use underpinnings shared with the VW ID5.

Ford is building the MEB-based EVs at its factory in Cologne, Germany. The plant previously produced the Fiesta small car, which has been discontinued.

The automaker's next generation of battery-electric cars will use a new software-defined platform developed in the U.S. The first cars using the new platform will arrive in the U.S. in 2025.

Ford has said it will build full-electric cars off the platform for Europe at its factory in Valencia, Spain, from the middle of the decade.

Ford's passenger cars boss in Europe, Martin Sander, told Automotive News Europe in an interview in July that cars on this platform will launch in Europe  after the U.S. but he did not given specific timing.