OEM&Lieferant Ausgabe 2/2020

81 Editorial by Elisabeth Klock and Dr. Rudolf Müller Dear readers, this was a hard blow for the German automotive and supplier industry and it came at an inopportune time. After ten years of prosperity, the economy slowed down and a fundamental transformation process into new technologies took place. FromMarch 2020, production and registration figures, sales trends and market data knew only one direction: downwards. And the crisis was and is global. It had started in China. But with an unexpected speed, all markets were affected with varying intensity. But the corona crisis hit Europe hardest. In the first half of 2020, new registrations across Europe were 39 percent below the previous year’s figure, with Germany, at minus 35 percent, still getting off relatively lightly compared to the other ma- jor European markets. New registrations halved in France, the United Kingdom and Italy. The comparable markets in the USA declined by minus 23 percent in the first half of 2020. The Chinese market also recorded a decline of minus 23 percent. Both Japan and Russia show similar figures. The complete shutdown of production was historically unique. Broken supply chains, deserted production lines and sales offices and a logis- tical standstill confronted the industry with unprecedented problems when restarting. Gaps in the supply chains were ruthlessly uncovered, triggering the need for quick action. The observance of hygiene regu- lations as well as aspects of social distancing in workplace design were completely new, previously unknown challenges. And as long as an effective vaccine has not been developed, the corona crisis will continue. But customers, industry and politics are learning to live with it. So, there are first signs of a stabilization of the markets. In particular, the development in China, by far themost important market for German premium manufacturers, is attracting attention. The Chinese industry association PCA, for example, reported a 7.9 percent increase in sales for July 2020 compared to the previous year. This nourishes the hope that China could take on a role as a growth engine comparable to that of the financial crisis in 2009. InWestern Europe, too, themarkets appear to be stabilizing again over- all. Although the overall market fell by just under two percent. How- ever, the markets in the United Kingdom, France and Spain were able to grow, in some cases significantly. Italy and Germany lagged behind this development with further declines of minus eleven and minus five percent respectively. Here, the VAT cut of three percentage points does not yet appear to be having an effect. By contrast, the increase in the environmental bonus for electric ve- hicles is having a significant effect. According to the Federal Motor Transport Authority, 35,955 electric cars were registered for the first time in July 2020. This represents an increase of 288 percent and a market share of 11.4 percent for new registrations. In the first half of 2020, 129,936 electric vehicles were newly registered, 128 percent more than in the previous year. Plug-in hybrids played a special role, with the number of new registrations increasing almost six-fold. This development shows that the corona crisis does not necessarily have to act as a brake on the technological transformation process in the automotive and supplier industry, but can also have an ac- celerating function when investments are specifically promoted. In order to take advantage of this momentum, it is all the more nec- essary to press ahead rapidly with the expansion of the charging infrastructure now. It will still take some time before the consequences of the corona crisis are overcome. But industry and politics have taken important steps to ensure that the recovery process of the German automotive and supplier industry is successful. We would like to express our sincere thanks to all authors, interview partners and our advertising customers for their trusting cooperation. We cordially invite you to join us again in the next issue of our magazine, which will be published in spring 2021. We wish all our readers a pleasant reading of our magazine. Please also take advantage of the numerous networking and linking options. Elisabeth Klock Dr. Rudolf Müller OEM&Supplier by VEK Publishing www.oemundlieferant.de VEK-Onlineservice www.vek-onlineservice.de