Ford never buried the 1.0 EcoBoost. The three-cylinder is alive and well — it simply vanished from one single market. The American one. In Europe the same litre unit is still on duty: the Puma crossover carries it together with a 48-volt hybrid system.
In North America the start was brisk. The debut came on the Fiesta of the 2014 model year. Then the little turbo triple went into the Focus and the compact EcoSport.
And then the cars themselves ran out. The reason was not some isolated technical flaw but a shift in Ford’s model strategy. Back in 2018 the company announced it was betting on pickups, SUVs and commercial vehicles — the passenger car range in the US was going under the knife. After that it was a chain reaction: the Fiesta and the Focus left the market, EcoSport production wrapped up. With no compact models left, the litre engine simply had nowhere to work.
There is another version of events: modest fuel savings, a noticeable price premium and no automatic at launch. It sounds plausible and it explains the weak demand. But Ford has never officially named these factors as the direct reason for dropping the engine.
Earlier it was reported that Ford has begun road testing the hybrid Territory in Brazil.
