The International Automotive Business Meeting (IABM), leading event in the automotive sector, took place on 20th October. IABM2020 focused on autonomous vehicles and electromobility and was held online for the first time. Despite the different format, IABM managed to bring together car makers, Tier 1 and 2 automotive suppliers, game changers and industry experts who had the chance to listen to experts of the automotive sector, discuss the future of automotive in Poland and meet new business partners.
The event was conducted by the journalist Artur Osiecki who introduced the agenda of the day, the organizers of the event – the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Poland, Katowice Special Economic Zone and Cluster Silesia Automotive & Advanced Manufacturing , the main partners and the sponsor Marcegaglia.
The conference was introduced by the institutional greetings from H. E. Aldo Amati, Ambassador of Italy in Poland, who underlined the importance of the automotive sector both in Italy and Poland. The intervention was followed by the welcoming greetings from the President of the Italian Chamber of Commerce Piero Cannas and from the Vice-President of Katowice Special Economic Zone Mateusz Rykała. Both highlighted the challenges that the sector is facing as a consequence of the pandemic.
Before the panel discussions, an interesting presentation by Carlo van Driesten, Systems Architect for Virtual Test & Validation for BMW, took place. The presentation focused on the need of virtual proof of validation and standardization for the development of autonomous vehicles (AV).
The conference continued with two panel discussions moderated by Luk Palmen from the Cluster Silesia Automotive & Advanced Manufacturing. The first debate focused on new products for autonomous vehicles and the opportunities and challenges for companies in the automotive sector in Central Europe.
It emerged, as Daniel Martyniuk (Deloitte Poland) pointed out, that market launches of autonomous vehicleswill happen most probably by 2035 and not by 2025 as previously forecasted. Finding a common ground for legal requirements in Europe will be a necessary step to further develop the sector of autonomous vehicles.
The intervention of Jan Kamoji-Czapiński from the Polish Investment and Trade Agency focused on the investment opportunities in Poland in the value chain of automotive industry and AV. Even though there is currently no legislation that allows testing of AV in Poland, the country was able to attract investments from big companies in the field. Another great opportunity is given by the new EU budget perspective: Poland is the larger beneficiary of EU funds, which hopefully will be used to develop programs to attract more investments and develop projects in the automotive sector. Finally, the expert underlined that Poland has a competitive advantage compared to other European countries thanks to logistical facilities and a qualified workforce at competitive prices.
The main challenges related to cyber security in autonomous vehicles and EU legislation were explained by Łukasz Rożanski from the Directorate-General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs, Automotive and Mobility Industries of the European Commission. The requirement from the EU Commission against cyber-attacks was issued in 2019, but it is not specific for autonomous vehicles. Two new dedicated regulations were adopted in June 2020, which have to be transposed by annexes and modifications to the EU framework and should become applicable from July 2022.
Finally, Bart Schields from Olympus Sky presented a new methodology for safety and integrity management for cars, Zeus Integrity Management Solution (Component Monitoring with Real-time Configuration Management Validation), which can provide continuous identification and authentication of all critical components and softwares for autonomous vehicles.
The second debate focused on the key-competencies for battery production and light components for electric vehicles in Poland.
The aspects that make Poland an outstanding location for battery production for electric vehicles were pointed out by the interventions of Jarosław Kusto (BMZ Group) and Jakub Faryś (Polish Automotive Industry Association). It emerged that Poland has a good quality cost-price ratio, certified and well-educated staff, as well as 60 companies already producing batteries and components. This point was confirmed by Marcin Korolec (Electric Vehicle Promotion Fundation), who stressed that it is worth investing in electromobility in Poland. The battery market is expanding, it was not hit by the pandemic and the demand for batteries is expected to increase by 46% in five years.
The debate was then joined by Helmut Wichmann from Coroplast Polska, who explained how suppliers can meet the challenges of light weight and optimized integrated solutions for hybrid and electric vehicles.
The future of hybrid and electric cars was discussed by Rafał Staciwa, FCA Group Poland. Since the EU will not go back on the implementation of environmental legislation and given the increasing pressure from the public to decrease emissions, a new trend is being created. It involves small electric cars for the city and hybrid cars to cover longer ranges outside of the city. In the short future some issues should be addressed, in particular the weight of batteries should be decreased, while their range should be extended. Rafał Budweil from Triggo presented their Polish-made, electric microcar. Finally, the debate was joined by Łukasz Maliczenko from Electromobility Poland, the company that recently presented an ambitious prototype of the first Polish electric car – Izera. Maliczenko affirmed that they are currently developing the plan to produce Polish electric cars in few years. The design and development of electric cars is complex and requires different business partners. The current approach of Electromobility Poland is dividing competences derived from already existing industries from Poland, which is an important supply base for the automotive sector, and from other countries as well, for example they are already cooperating with an Italian design studio. The idea of Electromobility Poland is to acquire already proven and reliable technology in order to start developing their own solutions.
In the afternoon, the participants joined the digital speed business mixer, the fast networking format where they had the chance to present their company and create new business contacts during five session of digital networking.
Organizers IABM2020:
- Italian Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Poland (CCIIP)
- Katowice Special Economic Zone (KSSE)
- Silesia Automotive & Advanced Manufacturing Cluster (SA&AM)
Sponsor IABM2020:
Marcegaglia
Partners IABM2020:
- City of Dabrowa Górnicza
- City of Sosnowiec
- Metropolitan Association of Upper Silesia and Dąbrowa Basin (Metropolia GZM)
- Polish Automotive Industry Association (PZPM)
- Polish Alternative Fuels Association (PSPA)
- Polish Confederation Lewiatan
- Electric Vehicles Promotion Foundation (FPPE)
- French – Polish Chamber of Commerce
- British – Polish Chamber of Commerce
- Advantage Austria
- Spanish – Polish Chamber of Commerce