- Ford chiefs think Fathom’s appeal to both gas and EV drivers will help it reach 100k sales.
- Automaker spent $2 billion transforming Louisville Assembly for radical production process.
- Cheaper Slate Truck rival undercuts Ford but sacrifices many everyday creature comforts.
Ford isn’t setting modest goals for its $30,000 Fathom electric pickup. The automaker reportedly expects to sell more than 100,000 during its first year, a number no individual EV from anyone besides Tesla has managed in America.
That’s according to the Wall Street Journal, which spoke to Ford insiders about the automaker’s ambitious sales target. If buyers turn up in the numbers Ford expects, the little four-door truck would immediately become one of America’s biggest-selling EVs.
Related: New Ford Fathom Prototype Breaks Cover Ahead Of Its 2027 Debut
For perspective, GM sold almost 170,000 EVs in 2025, but needed three brands and multiple models to do it. Tesla remains in another league, shifting around 357,000 Model Ys and more than 190,000 Model 3s last year. Rivian, by contrast, moved just 42,000 units in 2025, though the arrival of its smaller R2 will boost this year’s numbers.
Photos Ford
Ford’s confidence has surprised some industry watchers because America’s EV market is currently going backwards. Electric cars accounted for 5.7 percent of US sales in August, according to Motor Intelligence data cited by the WSJ, versus 10.3 percent a year earlier. August EV sales plunged 48 percent year over year.
The Fathom is Ford’s attempt to prove price can change that equation. Starting at $28,350 before a $1,595 destination charge, it promises more passenger room than a Toyota RAV4, along with familiar conveniences including a touchscreen and power windows.
Minimalist Rival
Those last two features sound unremarkable until you meet its $24,950 rival, the Slate Truck. That minimalist two-seat pickup uses crank windows and skips a factory stereo and touchscreen entirely. And though Ford has yet to release technical specs for the crew-cab Fathom the chances are good that it will equal or better the Slate’s 205-mile (330 km) claimed range and 1,550 lb (703 kg) payload. It should also almost chop the Slate’s 8-second zero to 60 mph (97 kmh) time in half.
To keep build costs low, Ford is gambling on a radically different way of building the Fathom. Its reworked Louisville factory will assemble the front, rear and structural battery-floor sections simultaneously on separate lines, then bolt and bond them together. Ford says the system should build vehicles 15 percent faster than the plant’s previous process, though retooling cost $2 billion.
To make that investment work it needs 100,000 Americans to sign up every year for the Fathom when it goes on sale early in 2027. How do you rate its chances?