[stuaxo]

Yes, flagship is pretty normal usage, very strange quibble to have.

[ajmurmann]

I don't think the word "flagship" is the issue. The issue is that no other noun follows. If this was "flagship factory" or "flagship truck" it would be much clearer. To me the headline wasn't clearer do to "flagship" being followed by "socked" which I am most commonly used to seeing as a noun rather than a verb, especially in a news article rather than a conversation in a pub.

[theodric]

^correct

As a Car Guy, when they said 'battery flagship', I immediately understood that to mean the F150 Lightning: the top-of-the range version of their most popular vehicle, which also (now) runs on batteries. (The Lightning used to just be an obnoxiously-fast V8 truck.) Therefore: "Ford's F150 Lightning is moldy." Ew, nasty!

Finding out that the author didn't intend "flagship" mean the truck, but a factory, is baffling.

[tomjakubowski]

Just search "flagship" on Google News and you'll see it is quite often used as a noun, and you're meant to infer what the thing is.

[zo1]

It's not normal usage at all, as it's missing the main "thing" that is the flagship. Flagship What?? Imagine it applying to any other thing to see what we mean.

Google's flagship?

Samsung's flagship?

Apple's flagship?

What it should be:

Google's flagship product

Samsung's flagship feature phone

Apple's flagship iphone

[FrustratedMonky]

Maybe because it is a simple typo, with order of words.

It is obviously an article about a factory that makes batteries, and it is important to Ford.

[zdragnar]

It's a descriptor, not a noun (since we aren't discussing an actual flag ship).

The title doesn't actually say anything meaningful.