According to a Bloomberg report, Ford expanded the use of AI across several operations in recent years, particularly in vehicle quality control. The company had expected the technology to reduce costs while improving productivity, efficiency, and the speed of inspections. However, the results failed to meet expectations.

Ford Vice President of Vehicle Hardware Engineering, Charles Poon, said AI is "a fantastic tool," but its effectiveness depends entirely on the quality of the data used to train it.

He admitted that the company had underestimated the value of its experienced engineers, many of whom had worked on multiple generations of vehicles and possessed decades of hands-on expertise.

Poon said Ford mistakenly assumed that feeding design requirements into AI systems would automatically produce high-quality results. In reality, the automated systems lacked the practical knowledge and engineering judgment of senior specialists.

He added that many experienced employees had left the company over the years, and their valuable institutional knowledge had never been successfully transferred to AI systems.

According to Poon, Ford has now rehired many of those veteran engineers to help train its AI and machine learning systems more effectively while also mentoring younger engineers. He said the company has recognized that automation and AI can only improve when guided by professionals with extensive real-world experience.

Last October, Ford Chief Operating Officer Kumar Galhotra told investors the company was integrating AI throughout its manufacturing operations. As part of that effort, Ford installed around 900 AI-powered cameras across its factories to identify quality issues during production and reduce supply chain disruptions.

Earlier, in June 2025, Ford Chief Executive Officer Jim Farley told author Walter Isaacson in an interview that AI would eventually outperform many white-collar workers.

Despite the setbacks, Ford said it has made significant progress in vehicle quality. The company recently ranked as the top mainstream automaker in the United States in the J.D. Power Initial Quality Study, marking its first such achievement since 2010.

In a company statement, Ford said achieving higher quality standards required rebuilding its talent base. It reorganized senior leadership across engineering, supply chain, and manufacturing, and rehired nearly 300 experienced engineers with decades of design and engineering expertise.