Ford employees live on via Blackmagic

[HSE2]

A leading Australian camera manufacturer is recruiting Ford Falcon designers and engineers


The widely-reported demise of Ford's local manufacturing operations in late 2016 will result in 1200 job losses, but there are rays of light shining through the dark clouds.

"Farewell Ford. Can we have some of your engineers and industrial designers?" reads the full page newspaper advertisement in The Age on May 29.

The bold recruitment advert is evidence of the demand for the talented former Ford workers, placed by Blackmagic Design, an Australian-based global leader in the manufacture of high-end video equipment.

The company is on the lookout for new designers and engineers to help create its next generation of critically-acclaimed video and cinema cameras, and the advert shows a 1977 XC Ford Falcon Coupe next to its latest product, the Cinema Camera.

The rest of the advert paid homage to the work of Ford's Australian employees and invited some of them to come and work for company. As Blackmagic Design CEO Grant Petty told marketing website AdNews, "Nobody had said thank you to Ford for building cars here for 88 years".

Petty said the media was obsessed with the negative side of the story, retrenchments and plant shutdowns, and ignored the good news for local manufactures, that "Australia is still making things".

"Ford engineers and designers had been phoning radio stations down here [in Melbourne] after the news broke, so I thought, let's get these guys in," said Petty.

"The car is the old economy, the camera the new economy. There is a whole new world springing up," he said.

And it didn't take long for a response either. "We've got some awesome candidates coming in. It worked," said Petty of the forthright advert.

http://www.carsales.com.au/news/2013...ackmagic-36906

[WASP]

I thought Ford wanted to retain its engineers and industrial designers? I thought it was only the good folk in assembly that were not needed post 2016.

[GavL]

I thought Ford wanted to retain its engineers and industrial designers? I thought it was only the good folk in assembly that were not needed post 2016.

I thought so so, probably just a marketing fail by blackmagic not understanding who was being let go.

[WASP]

I thought so so, probably just a marketing fail by blackmagic not understanding who was being let go.

Not sure it was a marketing fail from Blackmagic's perspective. Mostly likely quite a calculated move to head hunt Ford's top talent. They have attempted to mask their actions by making it a good news story about Ford, pretending the care about the company but in fact making it harder for the company to operate by playing on employee insecurities.

[VZTRT]

I thought Ford wanted to retain its engineers and industrial designers? I thought it was only the good folk in assembly that were not needed post 2016.

There would be engineers in the plants that will probably let go as they will no longer be needed due to no production. The R&D boys will stay.

[project 064]

Not sure it was a marketing fail from Blackmagic's perspective. Mostly likely quite a calculated move to head hunt Ford's top talent. They have attempted to mask their actions by making it a good news story about Ford, pretending the care about the company but in fact making it harder for the company to operate by playing on employee insecurities.

Not too sure about that, whatever pays the bills, & keeps the wife & kids fed, is a winner in my book. Not having a go at you either.