Ford vice president Charles Poon admits: Over prior years, we didn’t pay as much attention as we should have to the experience of our engineers, now we are ...

Ford has reportedly acknowledged that its aggressive reliance on AI-driven inspection systems failed to deliver the desired results, forcing the automaker to rehire hundreds of experienced engineers.

According to a report by Bloomberg, over the past three years, the company brought back more than 350 veteran specialists, internally referred to as “gray beards,” to lead quality reviews and correct mistakes made by automated systems. Kumar Galhotra, Ford’s chief operating officer, admitted: “We had been relying more and more on automated quality systems and not getting the desired results. We brought back technical specialists and they hunt for failure points before a part ever reaches the plant floor.”

Engineers restore quality standards

The return of human expertise has already paid off. According to the latest J.D. Power Initial Quality Survey, Ford ranked top among mainstream brands for the first time in 16 years. The improvement highlights the value of human judgment in complex problem-solving, something AI systems struggled to replicate.

Ford’s vice president’s admission

Charles Poon, Ford’s vice president of vehicle hardware engineering, conceded that the company underestimated the importance of its most experienced engineers.

“Over prior years, we didn’t pay as much attention as we should have to the experience of our most knowledgeable engineers that have been with us through many product cycles. Mistakenly, we thought that by just introducing artificial intelligence and ingesting the design requirements that we had, that that would produce a high-quality product.

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Balancing AI with human oversight

While Ford plans to continue using AI, executives stressed that it will now be deployed in conjunction with human oversight.

The rehired engineers are not only improving quality but also helping to train and refine AI systems for future use.Despite recent progress, Ford remains the most recalled automaker in the US, with lingering issues tied to past automation errors. Executives emphasised that these recalls reflect legacy problems rather than the current human-led quality improvements.

After Ford lost nearly $5 billion

Ford’s electric vehicle unit posted a $4.8 billion loss in 2025, as sales of its Mustang Mach-E, F-150 Lightning, and E-Transit fell 14% year-ver-year.

According to a report by Business Insider, on Tuesday’s earnings call (February 10), CEO Jim Farley acknowledged the setback, saying, “So I think the customer has spoken. That’s the punchline.” For those unaware, Ford was the first legacy company that challenged Elon Musk’s Tesla with mass-market EVs.

The company began in 2020 with the launch of Mustang Mach‑E. After this Ford introduced the F-150 Lightning in 2022.

The company witnessed strong initial enthusiasm as it received 200,000 Lightning reservations and projected 150,000 annual sales.However, the momentum faded. In the year 2025, Ford managed to sold just 27,307 F‑150 Lightnings, down 18.5% from 2024, and 51,620 Mach‑Es, flat year‑over‑year. The expiration of the $7,500 federal tax credit last September further hurt demand, with Lightning sales plunging from 5,197 units in December 2024 to just 1,724 a year later.