Automotive News Europe - June 2019 - 18

AUTOMOTIVE NEWS EUROPE

EVENTS

Volvo CEO worries trade war could escalate
DOUGLAS A. BOLDUC
dbolduc@autonew.com

.S. President Donald Trump's decision late last month to delay imposing tariffs on the European Union's auto
industry comes as a welcome relief to
automakers, but Volvo Cars CEO Hakan
Samuelsson says the potential of a trade
war between the two global power players is "worrying."
"The [Trump] administration wants us to
build cars in U.S. and reduce the [U.S.]
trade deficit. By coincidence, we are doing exactly that," Samuelsson told the
Automotive News Europe Congress in
Gothenburg, adding that when Volvo announced in 2015 it would build a U.S. factory tariffs were not a deciding factor.
"We will eventually build 150,000 cars in
the U.S. of which half will be exported.
And we will sell about the same number
there," he said, referring to a sales mix of
locally and non-locally built cars. "I hope
the administration sees that and taxes
somebody else."
Samuelsson in February cited the ongoing trade war between the U.S. and China
as one reason why Volvo's operating profit margin dipped to 5.6 percent last year
from 6.7 percent in 2017.

Samuelsson on mobility: "We should
offer [customers] the freedom to move."
Tension between the U.S. and China
caused Volvo to adjust its production so
that vehicles built in China were no longer shipped to the U.S., where they faced
a 27.5 percent tariff. Now Volvo models
such as XC60 SUV are going to the U.S.
from Europe instead of China.
The trade war also contributed to Volvo's
decision to delay its plans for an initial
public offering, which Samuelsson said

Toyota Europe exec expects
fuel cell prices to match hybrids
NICK GIBBS

ngibbs@crain.com

oyota believes the price of fuel cell
cars will match those of hybrids within 10 years, the automaker's European
head of sales and marketing, Matt Harrison, said.
"By the third generation we fully expect
fuel cell costs to be comparable with hybrids," Harrison said at the Automotive
News Europe Congress in Gothenburg.
"We believe fuel cell vehicles have a
huge potential," he said.
Toyota currently sells its first-generation
fuel cell car, the Mirai sedan, which
starts at 78,600 euros in Germany. Harrison said Toyota was "not so far" from
selling the second-generation model,
with the third-generation arriving within
a decade.
Photos: Lars Ardarve
18

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As with all automakers selling in Europe,
Toyota needs to progressively reduce
CO2 emissions from its new-car fleet
to comply with increasingly tougher targets mandated by the European Union
to tackle climate change.
"There is no perfect technology to meet
this task to succeed," Harrison said. "We
are preparing various alternatives and
will let our customers decide which form
of electrification suits them."

is not on the agenda at the moment.
"We are focusing on making Volvo greatagain," he said.
Samuelsson has been a key part in Volvo's turnaround from being a money-losing unit of Ford Motor to a profit-maker
that is on pace for its sixth consecutive
year of record-setting sales.
Samuelsson took over as CEO in 2012,
two years after Ford completed its sale of
Volvo to Zhejiang Geely Holding. He said
Volvo enjoys its strong position within its
Chinese owner's organization.
"Being a division is not the same as being a company," he said during a question and answer session with Automotive
News Europe President and Chief Operating Officer KC Crain.
Today the Volvo Car Group's assets include the namesake brand, the Polestar
brand for electrified performance cars, its
stake in Lynk & CO and its stand-alone
Volvo Car Mobility unit, which last year
launched the M brand to expand the company's global mobility operations.
When asked about Volvo's aim to become a key player in mobility solutions
Samuelsson said: "We don't need to be
too scientific. We should offer [customers] the freedom to move. ... People want
this freedom in a transparent way." ANE

60 percent. "It's limited by supply for the
second year running, not demand," Harrison said.
He said Toyota reduced the cost of hybrid
technology by 75 percent since launching the first Prius in 1997. The car is now
in its fourth generation. "Our next-generation hybrid technology will be more affordable still," he said. Harrison did not
say how the price of fuel cell cars will be
ANE
reduced to match hybrids.

Harrison said Toyota's hybrid models
will help it to hit the EU's CO2 reduction
goal for 2020. Toyota has the lowest average CO2 of any volume automaker as
ranked by JATO Dynamics.
Toyota sold 480,000 hybrids in its wider European region last year, including
Russia, with the technology accounting for 46 percent of sales. Looking at
just western Europe, that figure rose to
Harrison said Toyota believes "fuel cell
vehicles have a huge potential."
JUNE 2019

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Automotive News Europe - June 2019

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