The Buzz 1: Electric cars lost their image of being flimsy, slow and perhaps slightly embarrassing a long time ago.…Especially younger generations consider looking after the environment more important than roaring down the freeway, but newer electric cars have speed…Oil and gas companies look set to integrate electric charging points at fuel stations as standard. (roboticsandautomationnews.com) The Buzz 2: As of May 2019, approx. 2–3 million of the 1+ billion cars on the world’s roads are pure battery-electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, says the International Energy Agency, which forecasts by 2040 there will be 300-400 million EVs out of ~2 billion vehicles on the road. [roboticsandautomationnews.com] The Buzz 3: EV Level 1 chargers use a regular 110-V outlet and can enable apartment building residents to drive 30–40 miles on an overnight charge. Level 2 chargers use a 240-V outlet, are in shopping malls and parking garages, can top-up an EV in ~5 hours. DC fast chargers [DCFC] use a 480-V outlet, can top-up an EV in under 1 hour, but not all EVs can fast-charge. (www.reuters.com) Yes! The confidence of knowing that you can find a charging station for your electrical vehicle on any journey you take is critical. Only then can drivers and passengers plan their lives and travels around a dependable EV charging infrastructure. Charge point operators – organizations that manage such charging stations – are crucial components of this puzzle. How can they not only provide electrons, but also offer diagnostics, maintenance, price setting and data management services reliably? We’ll ask experts Marcus Fendt at Mobility House and Sebastian Wagner at SAP how these businesses can thrive in a new-mobility world on Charge Point Operations: How Electrical Vehicles Go Mainstream,

The Future of Cars with Game Changers, Presented by SAP

Charge Point Operations: How Electrical Vehicles Go Mainstream

The Buzz 1: “Prior generations took pride in owning products, but current and future generations are very different; they just want to use the product.” (Prof. Carlo Alberto Carnevale Maffe, Bocconi University School of Management) The Buzz 2: “Servitization remains something of an opaque concept for many manufacturers while for others, it is a journey they are already a long way down…the countdown to widespread adoption of some form of advanced services appears to draw nearer…but it can’t be achieved by simply improving or replacing separate legacy business systems and processes.” (fieldservicenews.com) As margins continue to shrink for traditional equipment sales, manufacturers must embrace new business models. One pathway for greater profitability is offering different types of services for assets. These could be a simple break fix, annual contracts, or providing services based on data collected from the assets such as performance benchmarking, predictive maintenance and even outcome or guaranteed performance. How can manufacturers undertake the journey to embrace these new service offerings? What sorts of intelligent technologies and business processes are needed to ensure that such asset-centric, data-centric businesses will be successful? We’ll ask Torsten Welte at SAP, David Lowson at Capgemini and John Maggiore at Collinear Group for their take on Is Service the Solution? The New World for Manufacturers.

Is Service the Solution? The New World for Manufacturers

The Buzz: “A business network is a complex network of companies, working together to accomplish certain objectives…The collaborating companies in a business network are not bound by location, size, sector, or number. They are open to new partnerships that help them to stay competitive.” (en.wikipedia.org) As discrete manufacturing continues to become more complex and decentralized, your success increasingly depends on the strength of your network of suppliers, talent, and partners. From running your supply chain to managing supplier relationships and optimizing service delivery, you need to learn how business networks enable greater transparency and resilience. This will help ensure you achieve your sustainability objectives – which you can then show to customers and stakeholders. Business networks are also instrumental in enabling new business models while removing costs from your value chain. Discover how these capabilities and benefits will become even more important in our post-pandemic world. We’ll ask Simon Ellis at IDC and Stefan Krauss at SAP for their take on Why Business Networks Matter More Than Ever.

Why Business Networks Matter More Than Ever

The Buzz 1: “Gigafactories” [battery factories for electric cars] could one day be churning out millions of electric vehicle batteries in the UK. The government has already committed the country to a ban on selling new petrol- and diesel-engined cars by 2030, so it seems that electric vehicles (or EVs) are likely to replace much of today’s fleet.” The Buzz 2: “Most EVs today use lithium ion batteries, but these have a number of limitations. Luckily, scientists and engineers are exploring a number of ways to overcome these challenges that could help give the drive to convert cars to electricity a boost.” (theconversation.com/electric-vehicle-batteries-what-will-they-look-like-in-the-future-164263) For electric vehicles to become truly mass-market, they will need highly energy-efficient and safe batteries. Good news: Several companies are designing and supplying electric vehicle OEMs and other manufacturers and industries with such power sources. With the limited availability of some raw materials slowing the growth of EV adoption, battery makers are innovating and collaborating to support new business models such as battery swaps, speeding-up charging times and increasing the range of EVs. And they are developing smart battery services to help diagnose battery failures faster and resolve issues earlier, to gain customer trust and loyalty and reduce warranty costs. We’ll ask Marcus Bohlemann at MHP Americas, Bernard Swiecki at CAR Group and Mukund Rao at SAP for their insights on the design, manufacture and sale of batteries and the battery maker’s opportunities and challenges on The Battery Makers are Coming! How Automotive Electrification is Driving Their Rise.

The Battery Makers are Coming! Automotive Electrification

The Buzz 1: “Supply chains are everywhere. From the biggest company in the world to running your household. We all have supply chain experience even if we don’t know it.” (Dave Waters, Senior European Supply Chain Manager, STERIS Corporation) The Buzz 2: “The importance of supply chain in the c-suite is immense. At one time supply chain was an after thought. Now with companies like Amazon, Apple and Walmart showing the importance of supply chain, no one can take the credibility away. Supply chain was discussed in the c-suite constantly in 2020 because of COVID-19.” (www.supplychaintoday.com/supply-chain-leadership-business-quotes/) This past 18 months, with the world disrupted by a global pandemic, have shown us the importance of supply chain management. The results are being felt today in many industries and the consumers who rely on them. To effectively cope with ongoing disruption, your company’s supply chains need to be transparent, connected and resilient. Lesson learned: Industrial manufacturers that had already invested in digitalization and Industry 4.0 were better able to seize the opportunity to reinvent supply chains and respond with agility to new business opportunities – new markets, customers, business models. Good news: By using real-time demand data throughout the supply chain and factory floor, newer and better ways to make and deliver things are now possible. We’ll ask David Dreyer and Chao Yi at SAP for their insights on how digitalization and Industry 4.0 innovation can help make manufacturing and supply chains nimbler and more resilient.

Is Your Supply Chain Resilient Enough? Time for Digitalization.

The Buzz: “Spare parts are the engine in the aftermarket. In the interest of your customers you want to make sure that it does not sputter.” (Oliver Bendig, German After Sales & Industrial Manufacturing Lead at Monitor Deloitte) Planning and ensuring that your supply chain has the right aftermarket part at the right time for the right customer is an incredibly challenging logistical challenge. This is especially true in the automotive business, when it involves your customers’ means of transport and the demand is uncertain. How can service parts manufacturers ensure they have the flexibility and visibility to be responsive to variable demand, collaborate with dealers and aftermarket providers, and help get customers back on the road quickly and safely? We’ll ask Ravi Patwardhan at Deloitte, Guada Joseph at SAP and Sundar Chandrasekaran at Deloitte for their expert insights on how to make planning and managing service parts a more reliable process on Automotive Service Parts Planning: Streamline Your Aftermarket for Reliability.

Automotive Service Parts Planning: Streamline Your Aftermarket

The Buzz 1: Outcome selling is a framework that prioritizes a customer’s desired outcomes, rather than simply pushing the sale of your product. Outcomes are long-term gains that result from a product’s benefits. [blog.hubspot.com/sales/outcome-selling] The Buzz 2: “Suppose you owned an airline and ordered an engine from Rolls-Royce or GE. What are you really looking for? A piece of machinery to meet a product need? Or a powerful, safe, and reliable means to deliver air passengers to their destinations? This question has been top-of-mind among manufacturers aiming to drive profitable growth, triggering a fundamental shift to the way a business operates that increasingly focuses on outcomes. For example, when Rolls Royce or GE provide a “power by the hour” engine solution, they are delivering an outcome and potentially more value to the customer.” [hbr.org/2016/06/manufacturing-companies-need-to-sell-outcomes-not-products] As manufacturing companies shift from selling equipment to selling solutions and outcomes, their sales organizations, processes and technology need to shift accordingly. Only when you achieve deeper collaboration between sales and engineering, as well as the integration of front and back-office functions, can sales teams excite and influence customer decision making. We’ll ask Gustavo Millan at SAP, Henk Meeter at Echelon Solutions Group, and Vishal Chaturvedi at IBM for their insights on how manufacturing companies can shorten sales cycles, increase revenue and boost customer satisfaction, on From Selling Equipment to Selling Outcomes: Intelligent Technology.

From Selling Equipment to Selling Outcomes-Intelligent Technology

The buzz: “Despite the gloom, the auto industry is far from stagnant. The next decade will be one of its biggest yet. 2020 gave automakers the opportunity to reposition themselves as they emerge from the crisis on a new path towards electrification and connectivity.…2021 will see a continuation of trends that have been bubbling even before COVID.” (https://www.automotiveworld.com/articles/whats-next-for-the-automotive-industry-in-2021/ January 22, 2021) Automotive suppliers were severely tested in 2020 as they scrambled to pivot and stay agile in order to deal with the fallout of a global pandemic – including lockdowns, disrupted supply chains, and remote workers. Now in Spring 2021, there is good news. Suppliers can leverage this disruption to emerge stronger and better capable of tackling the accelerating trends of autonomous driving and electrification that confront mobility providers. How will supplier companies that survived perform in 2021? How can they operate profitably and drive new growth? We’ll ask Markus Scherbaum at Capgemini and Rich Lindow at SAP for their take on Rise Better: How Automotive Suppliers Can Thrive Post-Pandemic.

Rise Better: How Automotive Suppliers Can Thrive Post-Pandemic

The buzz: “If the events of the past few months have been any indication, manufacturers will need to get comfortable operating in an environment of constant uncertainty and change…to monitor these changes and determine the implications for their business strategy and their relationships with their suppliers and customers.” [www.bdo.com/insights/industries/manufacturing-distribution/what-the-post-covid-19-world-could-look-like-for-m] How can manufacturers manage this “new normal”? They need to ensure research and design efforts are customer-centric and can be brought to market quickly. Industrial equipment and products need to support new as-a-service business models that impact the design process and collaboration across the value chain. And they must continue to design and deliver custom-tailored products and solutions that customers want and need. Hint: Industry 4.0 capabilities can help with these challenges. We’ll ask Joe Bohman at Siemens, and Bernard Meyer and Richard Howells at SAP how the design process is evolving and the importance of having intelligent solutions to streamline and integrate product and solution design, on How Manufacturers Build The Next Generation Products and Solutions.

How Manufacturers Build The Next Generation Products & Solutions

The buzz: “If I could wave a magic wand and entice young girls and diverse ethnicities to come racing to automotive and mobility because it is so very exciting and sexy, I’d do it tomorrow. We all need to work together as an industry.” (Carla Bailo, Center for Automotive Research) A global pandemic. Workforce generational transition and the resulting talent shortage. The arrival of next-gen mobility. Emerging new competitors. These disruptions and long-term trends are fundamentally reshaping the way work gets done in manufacturing, including at automotive companies. And they are impacting capabilities, processes, objectives and systems that enable positive employee experiences. How can employers ensure worker safety while investing in talent to ensure their skills are current and can tackle challenges including high-tech mobility? In our Season 6 opener, we’ll ask SAP’s Tom Madonna and Kerry Brown for their take on The Manufacturing Workforce: Thriving in a Changed World.

The Manufacturing Workforce: Thriving in a Changed World

The buzz: “Countries that currently possess or are investing actively in the skills, capital, and infrastructure of the future are the ones that will dominate global manufacturing in the years ahead.” (www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2020/03/04) 2020 has been a year of unexpected major disruptions for industrial manufacturers, and more is expected in 2021. To weather the current and approaching storms, successful companies are doubling down on the digitalization of supply chains and manufacturing, and how they engage with customers. Will the adoption of Industry 4.0 technologies – AI, advanced analytics, robotics, additive manufacturing – drive flexibility and resilience and help them manage growing cyber threats? What will the increased focus on sustainability mean? Will there still be a shortage of qualified workforce? We’ll ask IBM’s Valerie Clark, Omdia’s Fabio Raffo and SAP’s Patrick Lamm for their insights on The Future of Industrial Manufacturing in 2021 and Beyond.

Encore The Future of Industrial Manufacturing in 2021 and Beyond

The Future of Industrial Manufacturing in 2021 and Beyond

The buzz: How has the crisis changed automotive decision-makers' thinking around preparedness, global integration, and handling the “unknown unknowns” of the global economy? https://car.live.ft.com From a global pandemic to major trade and manufacturing disruptions, 2020 is one of the automotive industry’s most unexpected and challenging years. Even in the Great Recession, automotive production lines never came to a full stop. Those in this industry now have a new appreciation for the frailty of international supply chains as well as the need to safeguard workers' health. What does the near-term future hold? Will the C.A.S.E. megatrends – Connected, Autonomous, Shared and Electric – still impact mobility? What new speed bumps, detours and potholes might be on the road ahead for this industry? We’ll ask Rick Varner and Bill Newman for their expert insights as they take stock and look ahead to 2021 and beyond.

The Future of Mobility in 2021 and Beyond

The buzz: “Given the pace of change in the automotive space and related technologies, combined with increasing regulatory scrutiny and recent developments in trade and M&A, the global automotive industry can anticipate several risks and challenges…in 2019 and beyond…warranty, recall, and litigation risk for suppliers, connected cars and cybersecurity, intellectual property implications of autonomous vehicle technology…” jdsupra.com Mobility has undergone fundamental transformations in the past decade. From suppliers to OEMs, everyone in the landscape is confronting legal questions. While new technologies and business models hold great promise, they could run against current regulatory limits. How can automotive companies innovate confidently while protecting the businesses from legal scrutiny? We’ll ask Jennifer Dukarski at Butzel Long, and Mike Newell and Renee Stephens at We Predict for their take on Balancing Law and Innovation in the Automotive Industry in 2020 and Beyond.

Balancing Law and Innovation in the Automotive Industry in 2020 and Beyond

The buzz: “The potential value unlocked by AI in helping design out waste in a circular economy for food is up to $127 billion a year in 2030…for consumer electronics is up to $90B a year in 2030.” mckinsey.com As industrial manufacturers begin or continue to embrace innovative technologies, important challenges emerge. What role does a commitment to sustainability play in their business decisions, especially in the current business climate? If they decide to contribute to the circular economy, how can they do it meaningfully? And how do they ensure they are using Artificial Intelligence applications ethically? Our panel will discuss these questions from multiple perspectives to discover the business case for embracing and embedding sustainable and ethical practices into the manufacturing process. We’ll ask Lian Jye Su at ABI Research, and Georg Kube and Elvira Wallis at SAP for their take on Manufacturing of the Future: The Central Role of Sustainability, AI and Ethics.

Manufacturing of the Future: The Central Role of Sustainability, AI and Ethics

Game-changing technology strategies are transformational, exciting and disruptive for a reason. They shake up your status quo. They get you thinking about new ways to scale, compete and grow. They move you in amazing new directions. Join host Bonnie D. Graham as she invites you to take an additional coffee break with game-changers for our special series on how SAP is taking its unrivaled industry expertise into the cloud, on the Future of Cars with Game Changers. Learn how you can be the savvy Automotive Maestro, Business Transformer or Disruptor who takes your company across the finish line as you look ahead to the next wave of Automotive industry transformation solutions. The Future of Cars with Game Changers, presented by SAP, can be heard live Tuesdays at 7 AM Pacific / 10 AM Eastern on the VoiceAmerica Business Channel.

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The Future of Cars with Game Changers, Presented by SAP

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