FORD Motor sees low-cost Chinese electric vehicles (EVs) as a “colossal strategic threat” that will ultimately arrive on United States shores, adding to the challenges for an automaker already confronting shaky consumer demand for plug-in cars.

“They are ahead of us in this technology,” Marin Gjaja, chief operating officer of Ford’s EV unit, Model e, said on Wednesday (Feb 14). “We look at that and say, ‘That’s coming here eventually, so we’d better get fit now and better get going on EVs or we don’t have a future as a company.’”

Ford is recalibrating its EV strategy as mainstream US consumers baulk at the high price of battery-powered models and the spotty charging infrastructure. Chief executive officer Jim Farley revealed last week that Ford is working on low-cost EVs to take on Chinese competition and an affordable model that Tesla says it has coming. China’s BYD recently surpassed Tesla as the world’s largest EV maker, with low-priced models such as its US$11,000 Seagull.

Speaking in a panel discussion on disruptive technology in Detroit, Gjaja said Ford expects Chinese automakers to build factories in Mexico to get around the 27.5 per cent US tariff on EVs made in China. He cited news reports that BYD is already scouting factory sites in Mexico.

“If I was sitting in China right now running a Chinese OEM, I’d be looking for land in Mexico because you’ve got a supplier base, low cost of construction, low cost of labour and the USMCA” trade agreement “that gives you access to the US”, Gjaja said. “They’re going to come here, just as the Japanese ended up here, the Koreans ended up here and the Germans ended up here. It’s a big market.” BLOOMBERG