Ford is not exactly disappearing but with that big a cut in their white collar workforce it looks like they are "outsourcing" administration to their overseas divisions.
Someone is "protecting the dealerships" too. This is a very stupid move ~ sure, they might need all those dealers in the future, but you can contract for that service as needed. International Harvester even went so far as to absorb the debts of its dealership network ~ a vast sum of money at the time that turned out to be more than the company itself was worth.
They went out of business.
Ford is going to go out of business eventually doing this.
It will be interesting to see who buys which current Ford assets at bankruptcy ~ certainly won't be the dealers they are protecting today.
This "outsourcing of white collar jobs" is a fad.
Right now to get a Purchase Order from GM it has to go from Warren MI to India, and after we invoice the disbursement comes form Jamaica.
IN 4 years they will realize this is inefficient and more costly than being done now... but by then the 'Genius' who came up with this unworkable system will have moved on to his new job and this will disappear as fast as it came.
Just look at GM's past programs: Zero Defects, Targets for Excellence etc. all of them lasted 3 to 4 years and then silently died.