In the aisles of the 2023 Auto Industry Day

• A look back at the 3rd  edition of Filière Automobile & Mobilités, held at the Carrousel du Louvre in October 2023.

The annual meeting of the French automotive industry took place last October at the Carrousel du Louvre. It was an opportunity for all the players in the industry to share and discuss the roadmap for the transition to electric vehicles and the challenges involved.

Several issues were raised, including manufacturing, training and recruitment, and distribution. The whole value chain will change, we won’t be making the same products we used to. Technologies are changing and so are jobs.

This transformation is taking place in a context of uncertainty (conflicts, inflation) and is strongly influenced, as Minister Bruno Le Maire reminded us, by two major macro-objectives at French and European level: sovereignty and reindustrialization.

It’s impressive to see how such a complex, sophisticated, century-old industry has managed to evolve so much in such a short time. This is one of the main conclusions of economist Nicolas Bouzou’s assessment of the industry.

His second lesson refers to a change in logic on a global scale that we should be aware of: « The economy has become the adjustment variable for geopolitical strategies. Recently, the relationship has been reversed. But “the world driven by economics is predictable and rational, because we’re in the business of self-interest. With geopolitics, we enter the realm of passions, which is much more unpredictable ».

As a result, we are witnessing a reconfiguration of the value chain on a global scale, with local anchors, which means that we need to work intelligently on a local and European scale.

In the same spirit of perspective, Jean-Dominique SENARD, Chairman of Renault, gave an insight into technologies, supply issues and national strategies, which was much appreciated by the audience.

We want to be an active software contributor to this transformation. With 650 million lines of code in a vehicle by 2025, the stakes are high in terms of onboarding, updating and energy consumption, especially in a fleet that is increasingly electrified.

Our first collaborations with automakers and equipment manufacturers confirm the added value we can bring to development teams and products.

And it strengthens our motivation to adhere to this necessary logic of solidarity and partnership between industry players, as Patrick Koller (Managing Director of the FORVIA Group) and Luc CHATEL (President of the PFA – Plateforme Automobile) so aptly put it in their concluding remarks.