Other changes -- all of which take take effect Nov. 1 -- are as follows:
Barb Samardzich, 54, has been appointed chief operating officer of Ford of Europe. She has been vice president of product development for Ford of Europe. She will report to Stephen Odell, president of Ford of Europe.
Joe Bakaj, 51, has been named to replace Samardzich as vice president of product development for Ford of Europe. He will report to Raj Nair, group vice president of global product development.
Bob Fascetti, 51, has been named to replace Bakaj as vice president of powertrain engineering. He currently leads engineering operations for Ford engine development and will also report to Nair.
Geographical challenges
The U.S. is Ford 's strongest market while its money-losing European operations are one of CEO Alan Mulally's biggest challenges. Demand for F-Series pickups, the new Fusion family car and Escape SUV has paced Ford as it's gained more market share than any other major automaker in the U.S. this year. It's trying to replicate the turnaround plan followed at home to return to profitability in Europe by 2015.
" Ford has two huge new products coming next year: the Mustang and the F-150," Alan Baum, an independent auto analyst in suburban Detroit, said by telephone. "They obviously want to keep their momentum going. They're also going to have more Fusions, and that will be a marketing challenge to keep the transaction prices high as volume goes up."
Ford captured 16 percent of U.S. light-vehicle deliveries through August, up from 15.6 percent a year earlier. In Europe, the automaker has reported five straight months of market share increases, driven by B-Max, Kuga and Transit Custom models.
Europe losses
Ford in July narrowed its 2013 loss forecast for Europe to about $1.8 billion from $2 billion. Odell said this week in Germany the unit will turn a profit in 2015.
"Europe is dragging down the company from a financial standpoint," Baum said. "Barb is somebody Ford thinks very highly of, and they want to bring her talents to bear on a very difficult problem."
In the U.S., Ford this month began using a dealer-bonus program often called stair-step incentives in which the automaker pays dealers more cash per model as they cross sales thresholds for some of its oldest Lincoln models.
While Czubay said on a Sept. 4 conference call that Ford doesn't run stair-step programs, company sales analyst Erich Merkle said later the automaker is using them selectively.
Bloomberg contributed to this report.
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