SVT News...

Ford Expands Base For Selling SVT Cars

Beginning with this summer's introduction of the 2007 Shelby GT500, the Ford brand will let all of its dealers sell Special Vehicle Team products.

Now, only a limited number of SVT-certified dealers can sell the high-performance vehicles. The change could help Ford sell more of these cars and trucks, but some SVT dealers are crying foul.

Meanwhile, after a two-year drought for the SVT brand, its future is up in the air, sources say. It is not clear what, if any, products are slated for SVT beyond the Mustang-derived GT500, and Ford has declined to talk about its plans.

Ford has about 600 full-line SVT dealerships; 700 others were certified for the now-discontinued SVT Focus. Beginning with the GT500, Ford will no longer limit certifications; certification requirements will be different for each product. The Ford brand had 3,777 U.S. dealerships on Jan. 1.

"This will further strengthen the Ford brand by providing us with a greater opportunity to drive showroom traffic," Darryl Hazel, president of Ford's customer service division, wrote in an e-mail to dealers.

Ford says it's not backing away from performance products. But some sources say the company is folding the SVT marketing team into the regular Ford brand team. Some also expect that SVT's engineering team may be diluted or tied more closely to racing efforts.

That would be a remarkable about-face for SVT vehicles, which went on sale in 1992. Just a year ago Ford's product chief, Phil Martens, said SVT was bigger and better-funded than ever. Martens, who has since left Ford, said SVT would eventually have up to five products.

One of the new products for 2007 was to be the Ford Sport Trac Adrenalin. But Ford canceled it as part of its Way Forward turnaround plan. Ford previously had dropped plans for a next-generation F-150 Lightning.

SVT products typically sell for higher profits and at lower volumes, for instance, an average of 7,260 units per model year for SVT Mustangs. Ford has sold 144,994 SVT vehicles since 1992.

Ford spokeswoman Whitney Drake said the SVT organization is working on "several future projects that we aren't ready to talk about just yet." She wouldn't say whether the SVT name will be carried forward.

The SVT name already is diminished on the GT500, where the logo appears on the door sills. SVT is not included in the GT500 nameplate.

Ford is committed to performance, Drake said. Hau Thai-Tang, a protege of Martens, remains director of advanced product creation of advanced product creation and SVT.

Even though SVT dealers will get extra allocations of the GT500, some are upset to lose exclusive access to high-margin products. "It's a terrible mistake," said Beau Boeckmann, vice president of Galpin Motors in North Hills, California, which has had a full-line SVT business. "You had a group that was very focused. They really understood the value of that product."

Making that product available to all dealers will dilute the power of the SVT brand, Boeckmann said. He cited the SVT Focus, sold from 2001 to 2004, as an example. When it was made available to more dealers, "people sold it off like it was just a common Focus."

But another full-line SVT dealer said Ford's move might boost the automaker's performance business, increase volume and help the brand. Tom Addis, chairman of the Ford national dealer council, said opening SVT up to all dealers should allow Ford to better market the products.

Addis, dealer principal at Lake City Ford in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, said, "The concern has always been: If you have a product that most dealers can't sell, you're limited in how you can advertise it nationally."

- Amy Wilson, AutoWeek, Newsday, Sunday, April 2, 2006

Coletti Retires

Mustang Hall of Fame Member and SVT Director John Coletti retired from Ford Motor Company after 33 years of service, effective December 31, 2004.  One of Coletti's leading accomplishments was the revamping of the Fox-body Mustang platform into the fourth-generation SN-95 chassis that came to the market as the 1994 Mustang, winner of Motor Trend's Car of the Year.

After working with Team Mustang, Coletti was named Chief Engineer of the Ford Special Vehicle Team (SVT) and spearheaded the development of a variety of SVT performance vehicles, including the 1995 and 2000 Cobra R models; 1999-2004 F150 Lightning; 1998-2000 SVT Contour; 2002-2004 SVT Focus; the 2003-2004 supercharged "Terminator" SVT Mustang Cobra; and finally the Ford GT super car.

Coletti considers the GT his last hurrah at Ford.  "How can you top this?", Coletti says.  "The GT, to me, is just the crowning achievement in my life."  He went on to add that Ford SVT is in good hands and exciting new projects are on the way.

- Mustang Times, February 2005

Ford Hot-Rod King Retires (The departure of John Coletti, who revived the Mustang, changes team's gears)

Ford Motor Co.'s high-performance car guru, John Coletti, is retiring after 32 years with the company, a departure that leaves the automaker's Special Vehicle Team at a crossroads.

The charismatic Coletti, 55, will leave Ford this month as director of SVT, which gave birth to popular vehicles such as the SVT Mustang Cobra and F-150 Lightning.

Regarded throughout the industry as a leading innovator of hot-rod vehicles, Coletti helped SVT chalk up sales of more than 100,000 premium-priced, high-performance cars and trucks since 1992.

"John is an icon," said Phil Martens, Ford's group vice president of product creation. "Inside and outside of the company, he is extremely highly regarded. You have to step back and say, quite frankly, SVT is what it is today because of John."

Coletti said his decision was a personal one. "I've been thinking about this since March," he said. "This is the right time. It's an orderly succession."

Coletti is confident that SVT will thrive. "They have a cycle plan," he said. "That organization is going to endure."

At the moment, though, SVT is stuck in neutral. The end of the 2004 model year marked the beginning of a two-year hiatus for SVT-brand Ford vehicles.

Production of the next-generation F-150 SVT Lightning pickup will be postponed until after the debut in 2006 of the 2007 SVT Mustang Cobra. And the 2004 model is the last for the SVT Focus, which garnered acclaim for its spunk and handling.

Longtime fans of the SVT vehicles are concerned about the direction of the line.

"Lightning owners are very disappointed," said Brian Shafranek, 42, of Pittsburgh, who owns a 2003 SVT Mustang Cobra. "I would like to see the brand expanded."

With SVT in for a prolonged pit stop, the competition is expanding their high-performance offering.

The Street and Racing Technology, or SRT, division of DaimlerChrysler AG's Chrysler Group is launching its eighth product in February with the debut of the Chrysler 300 SRT-8.

And General Motors Corp. is rolling out a pair of Saturn vehicles under its Red Line brand, while Cadillac and Chevrolet plan to market more high-performance models.

While SVT engineers work on the next Mustang Cobra, Ford could miss out on potential profits.

"A lot of us are making some reasonably good money because niche products are selling," said Dan Knott, director of Chrysler's SRT group.

Recent studies show that specialty vehicles, despite the considerable investment required to bring them to market, boost the bottom line for an automaker's mainstream products.

Rochester-based Foresight Research surveyed 40,000 households that purchased new vehicles and found that certain niche vehicles can burnish a brand's image. High-performance brands such as BMW's M line and Mercedes-Benz's AMG division can inspire the purchase of a mainstream vehicle or draw showroom traffic that could lead to a sale.

"We would love to see Ford continue emphasizing SVT because it has a lot of positive effects," said Steven Bruyn, Foresight's chief executive officer.

Martens said Ford plans to be back in the high-performance game eventually.

"We have a very clear view of what we want to do," he said. "And one or two is not enough."

The F-150 Lightning was postponed to allow engineers to focus on the Mustang Cobra, which has an avid following among horsepower junkies.

"The demand for the Mustang is beyond our wildest dreams," Martens said. "The expectation is that the Cobra will be delivered on time with quality."

Ford will reveal more plans for SVT next spring at the New York auto show.

"We absolutely have to be a leader ... in performance vehicles. It's part of our DNA. But we have to do it in a broader range than just the traditional SVT product programs," Martens said. "There's a broad opportunity for four-wheel-drive, high-performance, (four-cylinder), turbo-type of programs."

Hau Thai Tang -- Ford's newly appointed director of advanced product creation, replacing Chris Theodore, who is retiring -- has assumed responsibility for SVT.

Ford also has disbanded its Ford Performance Group, which was launched in 2002 to develop performance vehicles for Ford, Lincoln and Mercury vehicles.

Ford plans to adopt engineering lessons it learned from the quick development of the Ford GT, a 550-horsepower super sports car launched this year.

Coletti and Theodore played key roles in bringing the GT to market.

The GT and SVT vehicles helped make a star out of Coletti, who holds several performance technology patents. Coletti, who joined in 1972 as a product design engineer, was instrumental in reviving the Mustang in the early 1990s after then-Ford Chairman Alex Trotman considered killing the nameplate or turning it into a front-drive Mazda derivative.

"He was at the forefront, from the engineering side and even the marketing side," said Steve Saleen, president of Saleen Inc., which makes its own brand of high-performance Mustangs.

- Eric Mayne, The Detroit News, Sunday, December 12, 2004

Ford's SVT Line Looks Toward The High End

Ford Motor Co. will take its SVT high-performance brand upscale and drop the SVT Focus.

The demise of the SVT Focus is part of Ford Motor Co.'s revision of its performance strategy. The company will create a performance series for the Ford brand and likely will add a high-performance Lincoln sport utility vehicle and a supercharged Mercury sedan.

"I want to see product and performance across the range," said Phil Martens, group vice president of product creation for North America, at a press event here in November.

"SVT" stands for Special Vehicle Team.

The Ford Performance Group, formed in September 2002, is directing the strategy. The group develops performance vehicles and handles performance parts and services for Ford, Lincoln and Mercury.

Martens said the group will concentrate on three vehicle types beginning in the 2005 model year:

High-end vehicles, including the two-passenger 2005 Ford GT and the Ford brand's limited-edition SVT models;

Turbocharged and supercharged vehicles;

Mainstream performance, including the new ST label for the Ford brand's high-volume performance vehicles below SVT.

With the SVT brand going to a more premium position, the low-end Focus no longer fits. Production of the 2004 SVT Focus will end in the spring. Ford sells about 5,500 SVT Focus models annually.

"We are moving SVT upmarket in terms of performance, content, craftsmanship," said Tom Scarpello, SVT marketing and sales manager. "And, obviously, going along with that will be price."

The three-door 2004 SVT Focus has a $19,205 sticker price, including $545 destination. The five-door is $19,705 with destination. The two other vehicles in the SVT line, the SVT Lightning and the Mustang SVT Cobra, also end production in the spring, leaving dealers with an 18-month gap until new models arrive.

The next-generation SVT Lightning, based on the F-150 pickup, will go into production in late 2005 or early 2006. That will be followed by the next SVT Cobra - based on the redesigned Mustang.

Ford Division is creating high-performance models by using previous-generation SVT engines. For example, the Mustang Mach 1 is equipped with the previous-generation Cobra V-8. The Lightning V-8 also is used in the Harley-Davidson Edition F-150. John Coletti, Ford SVT Programs director, wants to do the same thing at Lincoln Mercury.

The Ford Performance Group has developed a 2004 Lincoln Navigator equipped with the supercharged 380-hp. SVT Lightning V-8, although no decision has been made on production.

Turbocharging and supercharging are expected to have a wider role in the automaker's power trains. A turbocharged 200-hp., 2.0-liter, four-cylinder engine soon will be approved for the 2005 or 2006 Focus. If produced, it would be a mass-market engine, available to all Ford dealers. The SVT Focus is available only to qualified SVT dealerships. A supercharged Mercury Marauder also is under consideration.

With the decision to drop the SVT Focus, Focus owners are being targeted with performance parts and accessories authorized by the Ford Performance Group. The Ford brand will use the ST designation for a range of high-volume performance vehicles with horsepower and suspension enhancements. The first Ford to carry that badge will be the 2005 Focus ST, a sedan with a 150-hp., 2.3-liter four-cylinder engine.

Martens said the ST designation will be used where appropriate. The midsized Futura sedan, due in 2005, is a likely candidate, possibly with all-wheel drive. He said the Taurus is not a candidate.

- Rick Kranz, Automotive News, Newsday, Friday, December 14, 2003

This page was last updated on 04/03/06 .

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