Eldersburg Native Plays Important Role in Development of Technology at Ford
October 6, 2008

Eldersburg– Ed Pleet, a native of Eldersburg, MD and graduate of Liberty High School, was recently featured in a Drive One webisode for his role in the development of cutting-edge technology at Ford. Mr. Pleet currently serves as Product and Business Development Manager of Ford Work Solutions, Ford Motor Company.

Drive One is Ford Motor Company’s comprehensive new marketing platform that showcases Ford’s leadership in quality, safety, green and smart technologies. Drive One is focused on grassroots communications-dealers, employees and customers- talking to friends and family about the important work going on inside Ford. The campaign invites people to drive a Ford and see for themselves.

A goal of Mr. Pleet’s individual webisode was to provide a personal discussion about innovative technology in Ford Trucks, for whom it was designed and why it’s so valuable.

“As an engineer in Ford Work Solutions, I was part of the project to identify the level of innovation within Ford Trucks,” said Mr. Pleet. “We conducted marketing research to identify some of the solutions and needs of Ford consumers in order to enhance product offerings.”

In meeting with consumers, Mr. Pleet identified those using trucks for commercial applications. He did ethnographic research to see how consumers use their trucks and what complications arrive in their everyday work. Through this research he discovered a variety of common needs and developed technology to meet those needs.

One such common need Pleet discovered and expanded upon in his webisode was the need to track and monitor work equipment. He discovered that workers using trucks were arriving to job sites without common tools they needed to perform a job. He also discovered that companies and individuals were loosing great sums of money due to lost equipment.

In order to solve this dilemma, Pleet was part of the team that developed Tool Link. Tool Link is a system that uses radio frequency identification to identify tools currently in the bed of a truck. It informs the driver as to whether or not they have the tools necessary to perform a certain pre-programmed job. This feature will be available in Ford Trucks this fall.

Another important need truck consumers dealt with was a need for information and connectivity on job sites. In order to provide for this need, Pleet and his team developed an in-dash computer system that provides high-speed internet, a touch screen, wireless keyboard and mouse and printer. In addition, it has an email client and can be used to make spreadsheets and other documents. It can also be remotely linked to a home desktop for access to files on another computer.

According to Pleet, innovations such as Tool Link and the in-dash computer are an important part of Ford’s goal to produce the most technologically advanced trucks in the world.

Pleet’s webisode can be viewed at http://www.fordvehicles.com/forddriveone by clicking "Drive Smart" then going to the second page of videos and clicking on the video titled "Innovation Built for You."

About Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company, a global automotive industry leader based in Dearborn, Mich., manufactures or distributes automobiles in 200 markets across six continents. With about 228,000 employees and about 90 plants worldwide, the company’s core and affiliated automotive brands include Ford, Lincoln, Mercury, Volvo and Mazda. The company provides financial services through Ford Motor Credit Company. For more information regarding Ford’s products, please visit www.ford.com.