"The European automotive industry is going through an existential crisis defined by multiple challenges: the transition to electromobility, digitalisation and automation and all this in a hostile geopolitical context. Losing market share in China, on its home markets and now with tariffs, also in the US. Cases, as Audi Brussels, Volkswagen and Northvolt, once Europe's battery hopeful, demonstrate this day by day. While electrification itself has a massive impact on jobs, electric vehicle manufacturing has redefined the foundations of competitive advantage. Europe's competitive edge in the combustion engine has no relevance in the electric vehicle era. The legacy of the combustion engine has become a burden compared to newly emerging electric car manufacturers such as Tesla and dozens of new Chinese brands.


This book provides insight into national case studies for key European automotive locations. It highlights two decades of dramatic decline in France and Italy, and observes how the apparent resilience of the sector in Germany has been shaken in its fundamentals and how the former success story in central-eastern Europe is now facing an uncertain future. It is evident that the industry needs to reinvent itself, again. After the 2015 Dieselgate scandal, it made a bold step to embark fully on electrification, but one that has not proven to be bold enough. The sector will, moreover, be a test case for the EU's industrial policy awakening and it will continue to be a laboratory for just transition policies and practices dedicated to the specifics of the sector."

Support: Digital;Paper

ISBN (PDF) : 978-2-87452-778-4

Legal deposit : D/2025/10.574/29