Ford Retail has sold off its nine European dealerships for an undisclosed sum to help it focus on the group’s 55 UK dealerships.

Chris Hayden, chairman and CEO of Ford Retail, confirmed the sale of its dealerships in Brussels, Amsterdam and Vienna to MVC, a New York-based business development fund.

Ford Retail couldn’t disclose exactly what the funds from the sale would be used for, but did say there were still several opportunities to improve its performance across the group.

The manufacturer dealer group’s exit from Europe will put its focus on managing costs and remaining efficient. Ford Retail believes its staff will have a big role to play in that, which will be reflected in its focus on dealer training next year.

A spokesman from Ford Retail told AM: “We are pleased with our sales performance so far this year.  We have experienced good growth on new vehicle volumes based on the new Transit, S-Max and Galaxy and order take on the new Mondeo is also strong.  We expect our used volumes to be similar to last year and moderate growth on our parts volumes as we establish our new centralised parts distribution structure.”