Ford CEO mulls taking Lincoln global: magazine

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Ford Motor Co (F.N) is discussing whether to transform its Lincoln into a global premium brand, its chief executive told Germany's Auto Motor und Sport.

"We are considering distribution in Europe and Asia. We already sell Lincolns in the Middle East," Alan Mulally told the magazine in an interview published on Thursday.

Lincoln, which builds the full-size Navigator sport utility vehicle, sold nearly 130,700 cars worldwide last year, but only 1 percent of those were in markets outside North America.

A spokesman for Ford qualified the report though, saying that while the brand's potential is there, any plans to go global would be "sometime in the future since the priority right now is clearly on North America."

U.S. rival General Motors Corp. GM.N also has attempted to broaden the appeal of its premium brand Cadillac -- maker of the CTS, Motor Trend's Car of the Year for 2008 -- but it is still dependent on its domestic market.

Of the nearly 241,000 Cadillacs sold last year, only 26,100 went to customers outside the United States.

BMW (BMWG.DE), the world's most popular luxury brand, sold 1.28 million vehicles.

(Reporting by Christiaan Hetzner; editing by Sue Thomas)