Ford Motor Co., the second-largest US automaker, has begun shipping its new aluminum-bodied Super Duty pickup, one of its most profitable models, from a Kentucky factory, the automaker's top North American executive said. 
"This is one of the strongest products in our portfolio," Joe Hinrichs, Ford's president of the Americas, said in a presentation Tuesday at a JPMorgan Chase & Co. conference in New York. "This is the first all-new Super Duty in 18 years." Last month, Ford said that its profit goals for the year are at risk because it no longer sees the US vehicle market growing. The cost of introducing the new Super Duty pickups, such as the F-250, was already going to pressure margins in the year's second half, Ford had said. 
But rising incentives and slowing sales are also taking a toll, as Ford's North American pretax profit slid 4.8% in the second quarter to $2.7 billion.