American Ingenuity

The smartest guys in the room, former Ford Motor Company executives and a team of first responders, asked a simple question: why hasn’t anyone developed a purpose-built vehicle for law enforcement? A passenger vehicle like the Crown Victoria is dramatically modified in an attempt to make it usable in the tough environment that is police work and, even then, the vehicle does not deliver on safety, efficiency, fuel economy, speed, or maneuverability.


While the mail carrier has a purpose-built vehicle, our first responders, the men and women who patrol our streets every day and every night, make due with a civilian sedan that is after-market modified to the point where the warranty is invalid and officer safety is compromised.

So why hasn’t anyone developed a purpose-built vehicle for law enforcement?

A team of Ford Motor executives spent years talking to police officers to find out what they want in a vehicle, and that vehicle has been designed: Carbon Motors E7. E7 is the brainchild of Chairman and CEO William Li. Li and VP and Chief Development Officer Trevor Rudderham know everything there is to know about designing a vehicle and bringing it to market. Another Carbon executive, Stacy Stephens, is a former police officer for the Coppell (Texas) Police Department and member of the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP). Stacy knows everything there is to know about the needs of the officer. He sits on the Law Enforcement Stops and Safety Subcommittee (LESSS) of the IACP Highway Safety Committee and IACP Division of State Associations of Chiefs of Police (SACOP) SafeShield Project which examines technologies for the purpose of preventing and minimizing officer injuries and fatalities.

William Li and the Carbon Motors team are going to deliver an unbelievable gift in the E7 to the law enforcement community, our everyday heroes. And the other part of the story that makes us smile is the where: this vehicle will be manufactured in America: in Connersville, Indiana, in a shuttered Visteon components plant. A gift to a town that really needed a hero.