Ford Motor Co., United States’ second and world's third largest automaker based on worldwide vehicle sales, made public its plans to bring on the market a new and more fuel-efficient engine in 2009 in its attempts to end its sales slide on the American market.

The EcoBoost engine, which uses turbo charging to force air through it, can improve mileage by as much as 20 percent. Ford officials, who announced the introducing of the EcoBoost, said the new engine can be smaller and lighter and all this without having to sacrifice power.

In his speech held at a company official briefing held on Dec. 11 at a company facility in Dearborn, Michigan, Ford's product-development chief Derrick Kuzak said he believed customers really want fuel economy and the new engine comes to meet that demand.

“We need to do it to gain share and volume,” he told reporters.

Ford was surpassed by Japan’s Toyota Motor Corp. in 2007 and lost the No. 2 seat in U.S. sales. Ford Motor Co. fell 9 percent, while Toyota Motor Corp increased its sales to climb on the No. 2 spot in the U.S. market and put an end to Ford's 76-year claim to that title.

Ford has had 12 years in a row of declining U.S. market share.

Also, Ford’s main source of income in the 1990s – the selling of large pickup trucks and sport-utility vehicles – was seriously hurt by the gasoline prices which reached $3 or more per gallon. With sales decline in its truck and SUV area, Ford posted a record $12.6 billon loss in 2006.

Ford also confirmed the fact that it’s negotiating a sale of its UK-based units of Land Rover and Jaguar to India’s biggest passenger automobile and commercial vehicle manufacturing company Tata Motors Ltd.  If the agreement is reached and the deal is carried out, Tata will earn a major presence overseas and access to new technology as well.

A sale of its UK-based units will give the American company the chance to concentrate on restoring its North American operations.