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Ford Pro has been the sector leader in commercial vehicles in Europe for the past 10 years, and so far in 2025 it has achieved a market share of close to 20%.

“And that’s just the vehicle business,” said Hans Schep, general manager of Ford Pro Europe, Ford’s European commercial vehicle arm. Vehicle sales aside, explained Schep, Ford Pro offers “servicing, our focus on uptime, charging, telematics, software and everything around productivity”.

The upshot is that Ford Pro in Europe is growing across the board – “really fast and really well”, according to Schep. He is keen to get across that a commercial vehicle business in 2025 is far more than white vans appearing from a production line.

“It’s really important that customers start to appreciate and understand the benefi t of the whole ecosystem around the vehicle to boost their productivity,” said Schep.

At the heart of it all is the all-important uptime: the amount of time a vehicle is on the road, and Schep says this is more crucial than ever. With the help of the huge amount of data modern commercial vehicles are able to give, insights can be produced to ensure vehicles remain operational, which in turn increases business productivity.

Schep said: “Utilising the data that comes from the vehicle, both on vehicle health and on driver behaviour data, and turning that into actionable insights to improve productivity, that’s a game-changer.

“Our customers are starting to do that, understand that, and they need help to do that, and that’s where Ford Pro comes in. We don’t just sell you a vehicle; we can sell you increased productivity for your business.

Using data to prevent breakdowns

Ford Pro says that if a user/business opts to allow their van’s data to be used, the van maker can – with the help of machine learning – predict when a vehicle is about to have an issue and therefore intervene beforehand to keep downtime to a minimum. Repairs are carried out at a Transit Centre or by a mobile service van.

At the heart of this is making sure your van does not break down,” said Schep. “That’s the number one pain point for fleets.”

This number-crunching and data monitoring is also moving Ford move away from typical service schedules and maintenance cycles.

“Maintenance schedules based on mileage and duration aren’t very smart ways of doing it,” said Schep. “A connected vehicle will tell you the best time to service it, because its use will be tougher than the standard schedule.

“If you follow standard intervals, you’re paying too much for maintenance. We only do what’s needed for a vehicle, and we do it to limit downtime so you don’t see any vehicles as being unproductive.”

A key part of the appeal of this paid service for businesses is that Ford crunches the data for them. And there’s a lot of data: some two billion data points globally each day from around four million connected Ford Pro vehicles on the road.

“Fleet managers at first said we were just giving them more work by giving them daily reports on their vans,” said Schep. But the information is more than just technical reports, and it has other uses. Schep added: “With insights into driver behaviour, we can look at where they can save fuel through idling, with acceleration and braking.”

While such services are now routinely being adopted by big fleets, only around 10% of smaller fl eets are using Ford Pro for these insights. Yet the use case here is even more acute, as Schep notes: if you have a fleet of only two vans and one goes wrong, that’s 50% of your revenue on hold until it is fixed.

“It’s important for smaller fleets to start using these data capabilities,” said Schep, adding that there are some 700,000 subscribers globally to Ford’s telematics service, which makes it one of the world’s biggest players in the space.

The goal is ultimately 100% uptime for a van, although Schep admitted this is implausible given the likelihood of accidents that require bodywork repairs.

“But even then, the repair time is carefully monitored,” he said. “We want to avoid unnecessary downtime.”

Predicting when to go electric

Data can also be used to help fleets decide whether vans are ready to be switched for electric models based on each vehicle’s use case. When a van does go electric, Ford can then help run it using software that covers everything from the likes of preconditioning to ensuring the driver is compensated by their company for home charging.

“We can look at how that van is used and make a clear case for it being electric based on how it is used,” said Schep, on Ford Pro’s work with fleet managers looking to go electric. “Or indeed if it would work as a plug-in hybrid, or if it still needs to be a diesel or whatever. We can help fleet managers make that transition.”

Schep admitted the electric van rollout is “behind our initial projections” but cited several reasons why. He noted two different customer types: large corporations that are committed to going carbon-neutral by a set date and those for which an electric van must fit their business through a use case.

“If you’re doing city deliveries and your route is 50 miles or whatever, that’s clearly an opportunity with EVs,” he said. “But with long distances and any kind of heavy goods hauling, we’re not there yet.”

While electric vans almost always cost more than their internal-combustion-engined equivalents, Schep said a van’s purchase price “is not the metric you should be looking at”.

Instead, he said, it should be the total cost of ownership that a business thinks about. If, for example, downtime can be reduced, then the cost of fuel and lower maintenance bills become far more important metrics when weighing up the choice of a new commercial vehicle. This, said Schep, will be the “game-changer” in the adoption of electric vans.

The Toyota bZ4X, the brand’s all-important mid-size electric SUV (or Tesla Model Y fighter, if you want to be confrontational) didn’t have the easiest start to life: delays, an early recall and then controversy over how big its battery actually was and how averse it was to cold weather.

Now it’s facelift time, and as that original car didn’t get the most rapturous reception, it’s a pretty comprehensive one. The front fascia has been revised with slimmer headlights and the wheel-arch trims, which were unpainted black, are now gloss black.

More significantly, it has had a range boost, thanks to both a bigger battery and improved efficiency. By reconfiguring the shape of the pack and the gubbins surrounding it, the engineers have shoehorned in eight extra cells, taking its capacity from 71.4kWh to 73.1kWh (69.0kWh of which is usable). There’s also a new version with a smaller battery (57.7/54.0kWh), but don't expect to see many of those in UK.

To make sure it lives up to Toyota's reputation of long-livedness, there's now a menu in the instrument cluster that shows the battery's state of health. It tells you what percentage of the battery's original capacity remains.

By using silicon-carbide inverters and polishing the teeth (dentists recommend both mornings and evenings) of the gearbox, the engineers have also made the drivetrain use less energy, despite a useful bump in power.

Tweaks to the front subframe and extra adhesive in the floor have increased chassis rigidity, while the springs, dampers and bushings have been retuned to make it feel more settled and improve the ride, particularly for the rear passengers.

The interior also came in for some criticism before, so that has had a makeover too. These changes have been partially successful. The old gloss black centre console with a hidden phone storage is swapped for a matt one with two wireless charging pads – much better.

The Lexus RZ has donated its larger, more sophisticated multimedia system, which means the bZ4X loses a few physical buttons overall, but most of those have moved onto a permanent toolbar on the touchscreen.

Compared to the RZ, the infotainment has had a very subtle upgrade, but one that makes a big difference. For years, the screen in a Toyota or Lexus would be completely taken over by Apple CarPlay, so returning to the native interface was a pain. Now the shortcut bar stays, making the whole thing miles easier to use. It’s quite a nice system now.

The last major change is that the pieces of fabric that lined the dashboard have been replaced with textured rubber. It’s soft to the touch and has a certain air of indestructability about it, but the resulting sea of black does make the cabin look pretty dour.

The space inside hasn’t changed. Rear passengers have good knee room but there’s a high floor and the boot is merely adequate. The seats are still quite comfortable.

Like most EVs, the bZ4X never needed more power, but then it was one of the slower models in its class, so maybe it did. Either way, the dual-motor version has gained a rather substantial 124bhp (that’s an entire Citroën ë-C3), which has dropped its 0-62mph time by 1.8sec, and you can feel it: it’s really quite brisk now. With its more modest 20bhp boost, the single-motor version remains an adequate but unremarkable performer.

Some paddles have sprouted from the steering wheel to control the regenerative braking. There’s a free-wheeling mode but true one-pedal and adaptive modes remain absent. The by-wire brake pedal is nicely progressive.

I was slightly surprised that Toyota tinkered with the dynamics, because I always thought the bZ4X drove quite nicely, albeit in a slightly forgettable way. Thankfully, the car’s character hasn’t changed radically. It still treads a middle ground between the overtly boaty Hyundai Ioniq 5 and the more try-hard sporty Kia EV6 and Tesla Model Y that suits it well. Mostly the ride is nicely settled and the handling unexcitingly competent.

Wheel size (18in or 20in) has a negligible impact on ride comfort, although the car seems slightly quieter on the motorway with the smaller wheels. This may just be down to the different tyres, though.

Since its launch, the hot topic with the bZ4X has been range and charging. WLTP range has jumped from 286 to 314 miles for the dual-motor version on 18in wheels and from 312 to 354 miles for the single-motor version. The 20in wheels inflict a 20-30 mile penalty.

I didn’t get enough time in the dual-motor version to get a representative economy figure, but the single-motor version on 18in wheels returned 3.9mpkWh. For a big car like this, even in perfect weather, that’s pretty impressive, and it means that even though the battery is over 10kWh smaller than some rivals’, range is competitive. How the new car will hold up in the cold is the critical question; thankfully, it will be winter by the time we can deliver our UK verdict.

It should at least fast-charge better in cold conditions, which used to be a problem. The peak charging speed stays at 150kW, but the bZ4X has gained a pre-conditioning function to make sure it can hit that rate even in winter.

It’s too early for prices, but given that the bZ4X is currently a bit more expensive than the equivalent Ioniq 5 or Renault Scenic, I’d hope that Toyota would nibble at it a bit.

Toyota hasn’t been the most enthusiastic adopter of EVs, and that has shown in the product. This update doesn’t suddenly propel the bZ4X to the top of its class but has been quite effective in keeping it a solid, no-nonsense option with, in the case of the dual-motor version, some off-roadability. We’re still waiting for that breakout EV from Toyota, though.

2026 Toyota bZ4X 73kWh FWD

Will be much better to live with than before but remains a slightly anonymous option in its class.

Price £40,000 (est)Engine Permanent magnet synchronous motorPower 221bhpTorque 221lb ftGearbox 1-spd reduction gear, FWDKerb weight 1930kg0-62mph 7.4secTop speed 100mphBattery 73.1/69.0kWh (total/usable)Range, economy 354 miles, 4.6mpkWhCO2, tax band 0g/km, 3%Rivals Skoda Enyaq, Tesla Model Y