DETROIT (Reuters) - Ford Motor Co. will offer buyout packages of up to $140,000 to all of the more than 75,000 workers at its U.S. plants, the United Auto Workers union said on Thursday, a day before the automaker details a revised turnaround plan in response to slumping sales.þþMeanwhile, two top Ford executives, including Americas Chief Operating Officer Anne Stevens, stepped down, just over a week after Alan Mulally took over as chief executive of the struggling automaker.þþFord shares closed down more than 1 percent, after trimming earlier losses triggered by a report that the automaker's own forecasts pointed to a loss of up to $9 billion this year.þþFord said it would announce its long-awaited update to its ''Way Forward'' restructuring plan on Friday.þþIn January, Ford had said it would cut up to 30,000 jobs and close 14 plants by 2012, but then said in July that slowing sales of its once highly profitable line of pickup trucks and SUVs had prompted it to move faster.þþThe number of workers the automaker will cut from its payroll in coming months will hinge on its success in attracting workers with the new round of buyout offers, which were modeled on a package offered by larger rival General Motors Corp..þþ``The pressure for Ford to accelerate its current restructuring efforts has reached a crescendo,'' said Merrill Lynch analyst John Murphy, who has a neutral rating on Ford.þþLooking beyond the scope of Friday's expected announcement, Murphy said Ford would need to lessen the grip of the founding Ford family on the automaker, negotiate a revised labor deal with the UAW and bring a more aggressive style to its management. þþUAW 'DEEPLY CONCERNED' BY FORD PROBLEMSþþThe UAW said the buyout packages, which include early retirement incentives, were also being extended to union-represented workers at Automotive Components Holdings, a group of factories formerly owned by Visteon Corp., Ford's former parts unit.þþFord had taken a cautious, plant-by-plant approach to its attempt to cut workers, but had met with more limited success than GM. GM had just under 35,000 workers accept its buyout offers.þþ``This was inevitable,'' said Richard Block, a professor of labor and industrial relations at Michigan State University of Ford's wider buyouts. ``After the UAW and GM agreed to the buyouts, there was no way that Ford was going to avoid them.''þþAs of early September, only several thousand Ford workers had taken the company's selective buyouts, UAW President Ron Gettelfinger said on Tuesday at the Reuters Autos Summit.þþSome analysts questioned whether Ford, which has a younger pool of workers than GM, would be as successful inducing workers to give up their relatively good pay and benefit packages.þþ``Given the younger age, it may not be worth it to leave,'' said Efraim Levy, equity analyst at Standard & Poor's.þþFord's board met on Wednesday and Thursday to approve the updated restructuring measures that the company said would be announced at 7 a.m. EDT on Friday.þþFollowing Ford $1.4 billion loss in the first half of the year, the automaker promised to be more aggressive in its restructuring.þþArgus Research analyst Kevin Tynan questioned whether Ford would cut deeply enough, given the erosion he expects to see in Ford's U.S. market share, now near 17 percent.þþ``The cuts are fine for the immediate landscape, but for the longer term, they are still not enough,'' Argus Research analyst Kevin Tynan said. ``I don't see justification of Ford stabilizing share at 17 percent when Toyota, Honda, Nissan still have market share to take.''þþTynan said even after the cost cutting Ford faced the bigger challenge of revamping its truck-heavy product line-up.þþ``The product side is where the real risk is, the real challenge is,'' he said. þþLOSS FORECAST REPORTED, TOP EXECUTIVES LEAVEþþThe Detroit News reported on Thursday that Ford's automotive operations were projected to post pretax losses of $5.6 billion to $5.9 billion this year while the company could lose up to $9 billion, based on a Ford forecast it said it had obtained.þþThe figures were from a September 6 internal report prepared by Chief Financial Officer Don Leclair's office, the paper said.þþ``We're not commenting on speculation,'' Ford spokesman Oscar Suris said of the report.þþMeanwhile, Ford said Stevens, one of the chief architects of its current ``Way Forward'' turnaround plan, was leaving.þþDave Szczupak, group vice president of manufacturing for the Americas, is also leaving by October 1, a Ford spokesman said. Both executives have been at their jobs for less than a year.þþStevens, one of the highest ranking women in the automotive industry, was named to the current post last October.þþShe was also in charge of Ford's efforts to more sharply distinguish its Ford, Lincoln and Mercury brands, an effort some critics have said did not go far enough.þþ
Source: NY Times
