AI fumbles led Ford to re-hire senior engineers
Ford executives have admitted to leaning on artificial intelligence too hard, too early, leading to previous employees returning.
The advent of AI has been celebrated in some corners of the automotive industry by reducing development time and costs, but Ford has experienced some of its pitfalls.
Speaking to US media, Charles Poon, Ford’s vice president, Vehicle Hardware Engineering, addressed concerns about the brand’s slipping quality in the North American market, laying the blame partially on its incorrect usage of AI tools.
“Mistakenly, we thought that by just introducing artificial intelligence and adjusting the design requirements that we had, that that would produce a high-quality product,” Poon said, as reported by The Verge.
“That’s where some of our most experienced engineers have had experience solving and identifying those problems before they creep into the system.”
According to Poon, Ford’s AI struggles stemmed from some of its most experienced engineers leaving the company before their knowledge could be plugged into its automation systems.
This reportedly led to Ford re-hiring approximately 350 engineers who had departed the brand, not only to fill in the gaps in the automated systems but also to mentor younger engineers who will be a part of the next-generation vehicle development.
“That’s where some of our most experienced engineers have had experience solving and identifying those problems before they creep into the system,” Poon added.
In the US, The Verge reports Ford has the highest number of recalls in the automotive industry, while it has also slipped down the quality rankings in J.D. Power's Vehicle Dependability Study (VDS), having a below-average number of problems per 100 vehicles.
Those issues are mostly related to the US and North American markets, where Ford produces and sells the majority of its vehicles.
With these lessons being learned, Poon says that Ford is forging on with its use of AI in vehicle development, with more than 100,000 automated tests powered by AI helping to make changes throughout the process.
“Because these tests are highly automated, even if we have a late change in the software, we can rapidly run back through the entire validation process to guarantee it works perfectly well before it reaches the customer,” Poon said.
“We’ve established software reliability as its own rigorous disciplines with strict metrics.”
Jordan Mulach
Other ‘legacy’ carmakers have recently sung the praises of AI, such as Nissan, whose global CEO Ivan Espinosa told Nikkei Asia that by using the technology, the new Skyline’s development time was cut from 55 months to just 26 months.
"A big part of this is built on AI capabilities and the utilization of new tools, more digital tools in the design phase, in the testing phase, in the manufacturing phase,” Espinosa said.
"China is as of now setting the industry standards of the future in terms of technology, in terms of cost competitiveness and in terms of development time," Espinosa said.
"[We need] to learn from China and export know-how from China."
