Tag Archives: mobility

Automotive News Europe Congress – how are the industry’s leaders facing up to unprecedented change?

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Four weeks today I’ll be at the Automotive News Europe Congress in Barcelona. It always attracts senior executives from across an ever-broadening industry, and now is a better time than ever to be part of it – the industry is on the cusp of dramatic structural and cultural upheaval.

POSCO_main_1300x550_170407The excellent speaker line-up reflects those changes. With SEAT, Lamborghini and Italdesign all on the speaker’s podium, VW Group is somewhat over-represented – that’s because SEAT’s the Host Sponsor, but it also means we get to hang out in Barcelona. And the line-up does reflect many of the changes facing the industry.

This is what I want to hear from them.

Luca de Meo – President, SEAT:

How is he intending to give Spain’s national brand sustainable relevance? They tried to become an Alfa-Romeo-esque sport-driven brand, and now they’re committing heavily to SUVs, but so has most of the competition already. Aren’t SEAT’s differentiators of small/compact cars and a weighting towards southern Europe also its weaknesses? How will SEAT integrate the VW brand’s surging EV technology into its own offering? And what’s the dynamic within the bulging VW group brand portfolio, especially the no-longer budget Skoda brand? As keynote speaker, de Meo’s positive claims for SEAT will be under close scrutiny.

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Brigitte Courtehoux – Head of Mobility Services, PSA:

More than one OEM has now publicly stated that they’re transitioning from manufacturer and retailer to mobility provider, but what’s the substance behind this? Nissan and Volvo have extensive ongoing consumer trials of autonomous vehicles; what is PSA doing? How is it approaching the potentially seismic consumer shift from purchase and conventional leasing to flexible and ultra short-term leasing, on-demand usage, and personal mobility platforms encompassing public transport, Uber and growing non-driver urban populations? And where does the Opel brand fit into this scenario?

Jim Farley – Executive Vice President, Global Markets, Ford:

With Mark Fields having vacated the top seat at Ford Motor Co this is interesting timing. Ford has lacked focus globally since Alan Mulally departed in 2014. In Europe the company has made money when others haven’t, and GM Europe has thrown in the towel. But Ford is still part of that squeezed middle – mainstream brands which cannot become premium but are not value brands or challengers. What is the global vision? The company could – should – be leading the world in mobility, just as it did with the Model T a century ago. And what is its future in a fracturing Europe? With profits in the region down could it even follow GM to the exit door? Farley, newly promoted to a global role but with European oversight, is touted as a future global Ford chief so his view will be fascinating.

Didier Leroy – Executive VP, Chief Competitive Officer & President, Business Planning & Operation, Toyota Motor:

Toyota’s first foreign executive VP, Leroy provides a uniquely European focus for the Japanese giant. From a European point of view Toyota is nowhere near its global standing – 10th in volume terms, behind Skoda – and Lexus has simply never taken off. Globally it has never owned the EV and hybrid territory the way it should have done as the pioneer, which has clouded its brand purpose and allowed the likes of Skoda, Hyundai and Kia to steal hard-earned European market share, and the current uncertain next-generation technology strategy isn’t helping. Now there’s a global profits crisis, so how will this affect Europe operations? The man with the longest job title in the industry in uniquely placed to make the company’s case.

Hakan Samuelsson – President & CEO, Volvo Car:

As a challenger brand Volvo has the agility to reinvent itself and shift to meet changing market needs. And, sure enough, it has just announced that it will stop making diesels altogether, admitting that meeting emissions targets is too expensive. Other than VW’s virtue-out-of-necessity move to EVs, the bigger players have too much invested in existing technologies to be as bold, but Volvo’s move to EV and hybrid power brings the tipping point into view. The company is also at the forefront of automation, with its brand imperative of safety meaning that Volvo automation systems will effectively become the industry benchmark. Can this small OEM be the catalyst to both the demise of the internal combustion engine and the mass adoption of automated cars?

Alain Visser – Senior VP, LYNK & CO:

As the face of LYNK & CO, Alain Visser is fronting a company embodying many of the challengers facing existing OEMs. It’s not only offering cars designed for electric powertrains and connectivity, it’s challenging the whole existing business model by designing one around emerging market expectations. Direct, online sales, fixed pricing, home delivery and a subscription model for the app generation. “The word doesn’t need another car brand,”, Visser said. No existing OEM would establish itself now using the archaic distribution models they’re tied to, but LYNK & CO is part of Geely and was dreamed up at Volvo labs, so can the company make it work and head off the Teslas, Ubers and as-yet-unknown disruptors who come in totally fresh, with no automotive background?

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Hildegard Wortmann – Senior VP, Brand, BMW:

For me BMW is in some ways the most interesting OEM represented in the speaker line-up. Recently replaced by a resurgent Mercedes as the number one premium brand globally, it has lost its way a little: a commoditised 3-Series, bland and questionable styling, not enough true SUVs, an i-Series low-emissions sub-brand which has stagnated with just two, polarised products book-ending a product void. And now it faces a fundamental challenge to its very purpose – the Ultimate Driving Machine – in the shape of automated mobility. What will BMW’s place be in the future automotive landscape, and how will it get there? As the brand chief, Wortmann should provide a clear insight.

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I’m a little biased as I worked with ANE for several years in the 2000s, partly on this event, but for me the Congress is the best automotive trade event in Europe. Readers wanting to register can get a €100 discount by visiting the link below and quoting the code LONGSHORE. It can be used for either the Congress/Rising Stars combo or the Congress only.

Hope to see you there.

https://www.regonline.com/registration/Checkin.aspx?EventID=1934274 

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Ford drives a future with fewer cars

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Shanghai overpassAlmost hidden behind the parade of new cars signalling a rejuvenated motor industry at the Detroit motor show, Ford has made some interesting minor headlines with CEO Alan Mulally talking about the bigger issue of future personal mobility. The remarkable fact here is that other carmakers aren’t also speaking out on the subject.

The motor industry is changing faster than ever before. But it’s a bigger picture than that. Cars are just one form of personal mobility. Private and public transport are merging. The whole transport landscape is becoming integrated, inseparable from energy considerations and the environment. Major cities are already at car capacity and struggling to develop mobility solutions which will work. Which are sustainable.

Part of this involves excluding cars from city centres, yet that is precisely why the car companies should be leading discussion and planning for future urban mobility. They need to not only offer temporary or complementary solutions but to be at the core of the new transport model, whether in providing micro-footprint mobility devices, public transport vehicles, components or infrastructure.

Easier for a Tesla than a Toyota for sure. But before long, car companies will not be able to exist in their current form. Mulally cut to the point, saying that simply building more and more cars is “not going to work”. The industry is currently focused almost solely on the existing model: customer buys car, uses it in all situations, swaps it for another. It gives the customer huge choice – of different brands and variants which don’t fit the world we’re about to be living in. It doesn’t reflect the culture now required.

Already, buying habits are changing. Consumers are eschewing larger cars. Younger people are putting off buying vehicles. Existing cities are adding pedestrian areas, bike lanes and trees. Megacities are evolving to a new, connected blueprint. Quality of life is as much a driver as consumerism.

Car companies traditionally don’t lead. They follow legislative requirement and market imperative. But when they do so they excel – look at the extraordinary reduction in CO2 emissions and increases in engine efficiency and performance over the past few years. They could do so in the wider, emerging mobility landscape too.

Credit to Mulally for being so direct. And why shouldn’t Ford be the car company to lead opinion? More than any other it has the mobility credentials. It’s an everyman brand, started by a man who gave motoring to the masses with the Model T, and in recent years it’s invested huge amounts in to environmental R&D.

Credit to Mulally also for admitting to not yet knowing precisely what role Ford will play in future mobility. But he’s giving it the thought it needs. And with that approach Ford could be a vital part of the big mobility plan. A mobility brand.