Ford is taking away a convenient feature because no one uses it
Assistance with an everyday driving task will soon be taken away from Ford drivers.
In-car conveniences are nice and convenient to have in a car, but it costs automakers money to develop, and install into every car that it offers it in.
To save itself some cash, Ford looked back at the books and has just made an executive decision to get rid of a futuristic feature in some of its cars that some find to be extremely useful. A visual demonstration of Ford's Enhanced Active Park Assist, which lets drivers allow select Ford cars to parallel park itself. Ford Motor Company
According to a report by Bloomberg, Ford's COO Kumar Galhotra told those listening in on its earnings call earlier this week that it is ditching Active Park Assist — a novel feature that allows some of its cars to parallel park on their own.
Galhotra justified the decision with data gathered from the company's connected car data, which reveals that "very, very few people" are actually using the feature.
Ford (F) offered the automated parking feature on a variety of cars from its lineup over the years, including the popular Edge and Escape crossover SUVs, the F-150 pickup trucks and the Mustang Mach-E electric crossover. Galhotra said this move will save Ford about $60 per car, and given the amount of cars Ford rolls off the line yearly - could result in a yearly savings of about $10 million a year.
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The decision to remove the feature is part of a larger campaign by the automaker to save the company a total of $2 billion. That would be helpful, given that Ford projects a loss of "$5 billion to $5.5 billion" for its EV division, Model E.
While the bulk of the $2 billion savings is targeted toward a wide range of operations from materials, weight and manufacturing, given Ford's ability to access vehicle data, other creature comforts might be on the chopping block very soon.
Follow all TheStreet's auto coverage to see how this story develops.
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