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The Ford Motor Co. is revamping its Lincoln car line to try to recapture past prestigeFord announced Monday it is renaming its Lincoln division as the Lincoln Motor Co. Building up Lincoln after divesting of investments in Aston Martin and other luxury brandsCEO Mulally optimistic that U.S. fiscal cliff negotiations will be sucessful After divesting from luxury brands purchased in Europe, the Ford Motor Co. is revamping its Lincoln car line to try to recapture the prestige — and market share — of the past.”We had purchased Aston Martin and Jaguar and Landover and Volvo, and we had decreased our [...]

Ford Motor Co said on Monday that November U.S. auto sales will show a rise of about 10 percent from last year. Ford said that total U.S. auto sales will be 1.12 million and 1.13 million, which includes medium and heavy trucks. Major automakers are reporting November U.S. auto sales on Monday. (Reporting By Bernie Woodall; Editing by Gerald E. McCormick)

LOS ANGELES Ford Motor Co will upgrade and extend the warranty by two years on its MyFord Touch system following a series of consumer complaints and poor reviews of the No. 2 U.S. automaker’s touch-screen entertainment and navigation system. Ford has improved the voice recognition capability and navigation in what it calls “version 3.5″ of the software, Mark Fields, Ford’s head of the Americas, said on Wednesday. Ford will offer the first wave of updates to some users on December 10. “We’re thinking more and more like not only a car company, but a technology company,” Fields said during a [...]

BERLIN Ford Motor Co may delay the next versions of the Galaxy and S-MAX minivans as it plans to shut a factory in Genk, Belgium, where the vehicles are made, German magazine Auto Motor und Sport reported on Wednesday. Scrambling to cut costs and stem European losses, the U.S. manufacturer said on October 24 that it plans to close the Genk factory employing about 4,300 workers by the end of 2014 and shift production to Valencia. The shutdown of Genk would delay introduction of the new Mondeo mid-size car, which like the Galaxy and S-MAX, is assembled at the eastern [...]

BERLIN Ford Motor Co may scrap more plants and lay off more workers in Europe as the euro zone debt crisis continues to exacerbate the auto sector’s overcapacity. The situation in European markets remains “very volatile”, Ford Chief Executive Alan Mulally said at a conference in Berlin on Wednesday, two weeks after the company announced it was cutting 6,200 jobs and production capacity in the region. “We don’t know whether it (European economy) will stabilize or hit bottom or not because it’s continuing to decrease,” said Mulally. The second largest U.S. car maker said last month it will shutter a [...]

PARIS/DETROIT Ford Motor Co, which clung to the road with a timely swerve before the 2009 crisis that bankrupted General Motors Co, may now be pulling a similar stunt in Europe. The Dearborn, Michigan-based automaker is scrapping three European plants and thousands of jobs while its rival appears to be stuck on the starting grid. The speed of Ford’s restructuring plan – and the comparatively slow pace of GM’s – has become more important during a protracted slump in Europe’s auto market, with sales down another 7.2 percent so far this year. Both companies unveiled hefty third-quarter losses in the [...]

DETROIT Ford Motor Co posted a third-quarter profit that trounced Wall Street forecasts on Tuesday, driven by higher vehicle prices and record profit margins of 12 percent in North America. Worldwide, Ford earned $ 800 million more through price increases than it did last year. Half of that jump came from North America, where Ford has earned more than $ 2 billion and posted margins over 10 percent for three quarters in a row. The No. 2 U.S. automaker’s strength in North America offset the effects of the sharp industry downturn in Europe, where Ford expects to lose at least [...]

LONDON/DETROIT Ford motor Co unleashed a second volley of European job cuts and plant closures on Thursday in a bid to halt regional losses that the automaker now expects to surpass $ 3 billion over two years. Ford told British unions Thursday it would scrap its Southampton van factory and an associated stamping facility in Dagenham in mid-2013, slashing 1,400 jobs and ending vehicle manufacturing by Ford in Britain. The move comes a day after Ford announced it would close a major car plant in Genk, Belgium, in late 2014. In all, Ford cut 6,200 jobs and reduced European production [...]

LONDON/DETROIT Ford unleashed a second volley of European job cuts and plant closures on Thursday to try to halt regional losses it expects to total $ 3 billion over two years. A day after announcing the closure of a major car plant in Genk, Belgium, Ford told British unions it would scrap its Southampton van factory and an associated stamping facility in Dagenham next year, slashing 1,400 jobs. Thursday’s announced closures end vehicle manufacturing by Ford in Britain and bring its total job cuts to 6,200, reducing European production capacity by 18 percent to save $ 450-500 million a year, [...]

LONDON Ford will announce the closure of its van factory in Southampton, southern England, later on Thursday to help it stem European losses, according to a source familiar with the situation. The move, which could see some 530 British jobs cut, comes a day after Ford said it would shut its 48-year-old Genk plant in Belgium by 2014, with the loss of 4,300 jobs, as part of a wide-ranging restructuring program. On Wednesday the U.S. car maker summoned British shop stewards to an emergency meeting at its headquarters in Basildon, Essex, around 30 miles east of central London. The meeting [...]