The Ford Motor Company (FMC) was founded in Detroit in 1903 and began exporting automobiles to European subsidiaries shortly thereafter. Cross-border assembly began in Canada in 1904 and was later implemented in European markets. The first European plant was established in 1911 in England, followed by other smaller-volume assembly plants across the European continent. All plants and subsidiaries assembled and sold the Model T, using American methods and practices. At first this proved to be a success, but in the long run “(…) it proved to be a costly and unsuccessful strategy in different European markets” (Bonin et al., p. 15). By the late 1920s most of its European subsidiaries were in trouble and Ford had to change its approach to the European market. In the interwar years, FMC twice changed course in Europe. In 1928 he introduced a plan for regional integration. This plan began with the creation of a gigantic new factory in Dagenham, England. The main objective of the Dagenham plant was to support and supply materials to other European plants in order to limit the need for American export of goods and instead integrate European Ford plants into manufacturing, supplying and facilitating trade across European borders . Using the Dagenham factory as a headquarters for European operations proved extremely difficult. This was due to tariff barriers within Europe and pressure from countries that insisted on keeping Ford production locally if it wished to sell in their home markets. “The result has been a retreat from planned regional integration towards fragmented, nationally oriented markets” (Bonin et al., p. 16). These ongoing changes also affected the approach Ford took to its manufacturing practices and, for the first time,......in the middle of the paper market...and sought to rejuvenate the industry by shifting production in Germany instead of Germany. export finished products. This was mainly due to rising shipping costs and tariffs, but also to the stagnation of the American automobile market in the late 1920s. In 1931 Ford opened a large manufacturing plant in Cologne, Germany. The factory was not limited to assembling cars, but also produced various machinery such as engines, transmissions. After 1933, government regulations and production restrictions steadily reduced the company's ability to act autonomously. As commercial passenger vehicle manufacturing was slowly eradicated, government contracts became the only source of business. Without these contracts, mainly for trucks in the case of Ford-Werke, Ford would have lost all its investments in Germany as the subsidiary had become extinct due to lack of market.