According to a new report by Bloomberg, Ford is planning to lay off up to 8,000 workers in an effort to cut $3 billion in operational costs from the company’s combustion engine operations, so it can reinvest that money in its Electric Vehicle programs.

Reportedly the cuts will be made to Ford’s Blue division, which is responsible for production of combustion engine vehicles, and they will primarily come from salaried positions. Ford currently has approximately 31,000 salaried workers.

In March, CEO Jim Farley had announced a radical restructuring of the carmaker’s operations, called the Ford+ plan. It created the Blue division, which was responsible for the production of internal combustion engine vehicles, and the Model E division, which would be responsible for the production of Electric Vehicles. Spending on EVs was also increased as part of the plan, to $50 billion, which he said in an interview with Bloomberg, was, “based on our core automotive operations.”

At the time he had added that they would need Ford Blue to be more profitable to fund their electric vehicle operations.

In the first quarter of 2022, Ford lost $3.1 billion, although much of that was produced by a decline in value in Ford’s stake in the EV startup Rivian. Operating profit had dropped, from $3.9 billion in Q1 of 2021, to $2.3 billion in Q1 of 2022.

In a statement to Car and Driver, T.R. Reid, Director of Corporate and Public Policy Communications said, “We are not commenting on speculation about our business. As we’ve said lots of times, to deliver our Ford+ transformation and lead an exciting and disruptive new era of electric and connected vehicles, we’re reshaping our work and modernizing our organization across all of the automotive business units and the entire company. We’ve laid out clear targets for our cost structure so that we’re lean and fully competitive with the best in the industry.”