Jim Farley’s garage tells two very different stories at once.
Here’s one you might not have seen coming: the CEO of Ford Motor Company has been daily-driving a Chinese EV for months. Jim Farley — yeah, the guy whose day job is selling F-150s and Mustangs — has been behind the wheel of a Xiaomi SU7, and he doesn’t seem the least bit embarrassed about it.
Know Thy Enemy
Give Farley credit for one thing: he’s not burying his head in the sand. The man has been vocal about what’s coming out of China, warning that EV makers like BYD and Xiaomi are “completely dominating” the market. He’s not whistling past the graveyard — he’s studying it. On a trip to Australia, he got behind the wheel of hybrid pickups including the BYD Shark 6 and the GWM Cannon Alpha, and walked away convinced these companies mean business and shouldn’t be underestimated.
That’s the kind of clear-eyed take you’d want from the guy running the Blue Oval. The Japanese caught Detroit napping in the ’70s with the Civic and the Corolla, and by the time the Big Three took them seriously, Toyota and Honda had already built factories in Kentucky and Ohio. Farley clearly doesn’t want to be the guy who let it happen again.
The Xiaomi Sitting in a Ford Exec’s Driveway
The car itself is a Xiaomi SU7, a full-size sedan that got imported through Chicago back in 2024. Farley has been driving it ever since — he told the Everything Electric Show Podcast in October 2024 that he’d already been in the thing for six months at that point. That’s not a “drive it once and write a memo” situation. That’s living with it.
It’s a move that would’ve been unthinkable in another era. Imagine Lee Iacocca rolling up to Dearborn in a Datsun 280Z in 1978. The pitchforks would’ve come out before he made it to his parking spot. But the game has changed, and Farley seems to recognize that studying the competition in your own driveway beats pretending it doesn’t exist.
The Polar Opposite in the Same Garage
Here’s where the story takes a hard left turn. Because while the Xiaomi is one of Farley’s favorites, it’s nowhere near the most expensive car in his collection. That honor goes to something on the complete opposite end of the automotive spectrum — the kind of car that burns dinosaur juice, makes a noise you can feel in your chest, and represents everything a silent Chinese sedan doesn’t.
The details on that particular machine weren’t spelled out, but the contrast tells you everything about the man’s range as a car guy. You can appreciate what the future’s building while still keeping your heart parked in the past. Any enthusiast who’s ever owned a modern daily and a classic weekend toy knows exactly how that works — you respect the tech, but you love the thing that makes the hair on your arms stand up.
A Foot in Both Worlds
What makes Farley interesting isn’t that he runs Ford. Plenty of guys have run Ford. What makes him interesting is that he seems to genuinely get cars — all of them. He races vintage iron in his spare time, he’s been spotted flogging Shelby Mustangs on track, and now he’s benchmarking the competition by actually living with it. That’s a different breed of executive than the spreadsheet jockeys who ran Detroit into the ground a couple of generations ago.
The Takeaway
There’s something refreshingly honest about a Ford CEO admitting the Chinese are building impressive machines — and then going out and buying one to prove he’s paying attention. The fact that his most expensive ride is the polar opposite of that Xiaomi says something too. A real car guy doesn’t pledge allegiance to one flag or one powertrain. He appreciates the craft wherever he finds it, whether that’s a silicon-and-batteries sedan from Beijing or something with a V8 and a shifter.
Detroit’s in for a fight. At least the guy running Ford knows it.
