autoregion international - Edition 1/2020

19 A strong and evolutive automotive ecosystem in Grand Est region By Vincent CAREL, Manager of the Lorraine Automotive Industry Association (ARIA Lorraine) Grand-Est region and the automotive industry have been undeniably linked for several decades, with historic players such as Peugeot and many OEMs which have set up in the context of the industrial conversion of the steel and mining employment areas for the last 40 years. Image: © ARIA Lorraine ARIA Lorraine www.arialorraine.com Today, Grand-Est has some 600 companies directly linked to the automotive industry, employing more than 85,000 people and is facing new ambitions to meet the chal- lenges of the energy transition in the sector. This has been very concrete for the past two years, with the PSA plant of Trémery- Metz, the region’s first private employer, which is experiencing a real disruption in its engine production, gradually evolving from the world’s first diesel engine manufactur- ing plant to a factory that will produce all types of engines for the entire PSA Group range. And this with an extraordinary rise in electrification and the transformation of production processes, which are entering the 4.0 era. Similarly, the Daimler site in Hambach is preparing for a new story, born more than 20 years ago from a revolutionary car con- cept at the time with « Smart », it is on its way to producing new electric models, in one of the most modern and eco-respon- sible industrial centers in Europe. The entire automotive supply chain, from rank 1 to the smallest supplier thus finds it- self at a real turning point, in order to adapt to the changes that will impact the sector in terms of products and consumption mode of mobility. The region is also lucky to have several internationally renowned public and private R&D centers and a network of high-performance universities and en- gineering schools in subjects related to the automotive industry : Institut de Soudure, CEATech, Institut Jean- Lamour, IRT Matériaux et Procédés, Arts et Métiers Campus, Ecole des Mines, Centrale- Supelec, ... An opportunity for the automotive indus- try is the proximity of our cross-border neighbors in Germany, Belgium and Lux- embourg. The Greater Region represents nearly 2 million vehicles assembled on its territory, more than 2,000 companies and 450,000 employees in the automotive sector. Vincent CAREL, Manager of ARIA Lorraine L’ARIA Lorraine est l’Association Régio- nale de l’Industrie Automobile de Lor- raine. Fondée en 2012, elle regroupe une centaine d’entreprises de la filière au- tomobile du territoire lorrain, de toutes tailles et métiers, et représente quelques 15 000 salariés. Ses principales actions sont la mise en réseau, les relations d’affaires entre membres, la communi- cation auprès des pouvoirs publics et le développement de programmes d’actions pour la promotion et l’amélioration des performances industrielles et humaines de ses membres. L’ARIA Lorraine et les ARIA de la Région Grand-Est (ARIA Champagne-Ardenne et Pôle Véhicule du Futur) sont en cours de rapprochement pour former une entité Grand-Est, qui regroupera plus de 600 membres à l’horizon 2020. Ces clusters automobile ont rejoint le pro- gramme Interreg PAE (Pôle Automo- bile Européen), avec leurs partenaires allemands, luxembourgeois et belges, pour unir leurs forces dans l’accom- pagnement de leurs adhérents sur les marchés internationaux et les nouveaux défis technologiques et humains qui at- tendent la filière automobile dans les prochaines années. Résumé It is a favorable force and ecosystem for meeting all challenges and making this space an essential European center for the mobility of tomorrow. All of this is already taking shape, for exam- ple, through the cooperation of automotive clusters in the greater region in the Inter- reg PAE (European Automotive Pole) pro- gram, which multiplies all the strengths of their members at a crucial time in the dis- ruption of the automotive sector. S H A R E