Summary of Motor Valley Festival 2020
For those who were not able to join the second edition of motor valley festival in Emilia Romagna of Italy (the italian silicon valley of cars, food, fashion and several more), the home of Ferrari, Lamborghini, Maserati, Ducati, Dallara and many suppliers of the industry of italian automotive. The meeting occured in the Luciano Pavarotti auditorium at Modena.
9:35 here we go! 400 participants in the beginning. The panel sits with a respect to the distance. In the panel we have CEOs of the leading car manufacturers: Dallara, Ferrari, Ducati, Lamborghini, Pagani, and Maserati.
Giancarlo Muzzarelli, mayor of Modena: “we will make Modena a center for autonomous driving”. This is quite a message being the land of super perfect gasoline engines.
Massimo Bottura, owner and chef of Osteria Francescana (the super luxurious restaurant in modena and probably one of the biggest in the world), invited all italian driven car owners to the reopening of the restaurant, for a grand event he is planning after the virus ends :)
Jean Todt, the president of FIA, the Formula 1, blessed the event and the italian automotive industry, which of course so important to the racing culture of the world.
Gianluca from McKinsey predicted that sales will return to normal once corona virus will finish. The target clients of luxury market seem keen on going back to shop once the situation is over.
Another prediction is the rise of autonomous cars in europe in the next decade. Only 45% of the vehicles worldwide will be privately owned. The rest will be public transport, autonomous and electric. That’s why he pushed manufacturers to accept that future and prepare to it. He also gave some recommendations of how to confront the CoVid situation better.
Markus Heyn from Bosch claimed, among the rest, that they already offer new devices and tech for the future of autonomous vehicles, with cameras and AI analysis.
Christian Richter, director of automotive in Google, recommended to analize the customer journey from first moment online until they purchase and use the car. from the big data, we need to be able to target our client base according to their similar activities. this would help us target our potential clients and offer the correct responses and actions on our side to the right clients.
Supercar manufacturer leaders share:
Harald Wester, Maserati. “we will change the way we work due to Covid… we will work from home. the motivation is what i look for in our employees. this is the real driver of our work. we would also push harder on virtual collaborative digital work… we will continue pushing electrification and hybridization.”
Horacio Pagani. “we will continue work because we have passion to create… we need to work hard to develop the passion in our young generation, if we want our cars to continue be relevant.”
Stefano Domenicali, Lamborghini. “we never stopped working. our young clients need us to continue. we integrated HMI with Amazon Alexa, we released a new car (RWD Spyder Huracan).”
Claudio Domenicali, Ducati. “face to face is a fundamental characteristic of our region. this is where we are better. our ducatisti and our workers feel better together.”
Enrico Galliera, Ferrari. “understanding our customer journet is in the center of our interest. in digital or physical… ferrari dont do advertising. ”
Andrea Pontremoli, Dallara. “the motor valley should stop be in competition inside itself. we should be united against the others. we all share the passion to create wonderful machines. we are already sharing the load in MUNER university to train our future employees.”
I also enjoyed a live debate about the effects of electrification and the future of automotive in italia in that regard. Specifically about Elon Musk with Tesla and SpaceX ventures. thanks Mirko Colombo, Lama, Gabriele de Bettio and Alessio Romito.
“Will Customers Even Want to Own a Car in the Near Future?”
In the third session, Paolo Scudieri (Anfia), Stefano Domenicali (Lamborghini) and Angelo Sticchi Damiani (ACI) spoke about the challenges of the italian supply chain.
The biggest question they talked about is the one about ownership. Will people even purchase cars or will they only rent for temporary time?
Damiani said that if demand for public transport will not grow, there is the risk of worsening the road condition and government support. Since there will be a rise in the environmental awareness.
Great thanks to Harry Kounenis for translating part of the conversation.
“The Heart of Innovation is Making Mistakes” (A. Pontremoli)
In the forth session we had Andrea Pontremoli (Dallara), Teodoro Lio (Accenture Automotive), Marco Gay (Anitech Assinform), Stefano Marzani (AD\AI expert), speaking about the Digitalization of manufacturing of cars.
Digitalization, AI, VR, AR, IoT, automation, 5G, big data, nueral network, machine learning, connectivity, simulations, autonomous driving, sensor fusion and software-update-over-the-air.
De Rossi, initiated the discussion by asking: “How does Dallara relate to all these technologies?”. “Already today, our design, project planning, and almost entire deveolpment is fully digitalized”, Pontremoli explained. “But for Dallara, digitalization is much bigger. We believe that the source of innovation is making mistakes. For example, you make a design hypothesis and come up with a plan, go to test it in a simulator, understand where your plan fails, and then go back to the drawing board. This process is key in the dev cycles”.
Marco Gay: “continuing investing in digitalization process of Italy and our region is critical to maintain our competitiveness in the market. Even after we had 5 million of euros”. Remember that other countries do not stop where they are and they keep running forward.
“Design is not only 2D drawing. Its a 3D sculpture, that explains also the sensual experience of our customer with the product. We use smell, touch, colors, and sound, to answer our customer’s needs”
The fifth session was on the influenced of technology on car design. Kevin Rice (Pininfarina), Carsten Monnerjan (Italdesign), Horacio Pagani (Pagani) and Walter Da Silva.
Lago started the discussion with asking Pagani: “What would be the influence of tech on cockpit design and infotainment system?”. “Well, our customers still like to see the traditional clocks and gauges, and less the digital screens. We use also the concept of smell, aroma, touch and how they mix with the color of the car”, answered Pagani. “The clients sometimes just enjoy sitting inside the car, with the engine running, or listening to the radio, or just smelling the leather. Often they dont even drive the car.”
Monnejan (Italdesign) shared that they use VR technology to simulate the car interior of a new car. They let the customer sit in a physical “bucket seat”, while adding a virtual layer with a virtual reality headset of the future design. This significantly shortens the work process with higher satisfaction.
Lago then asked the participants to give their recommendations for young design students. “if you want a good design, you still need a good designer”, started Walter Da-Silva. “New designers should learn humility. You will make mistakes and you should learn from them.”
“Start with a pencil. Work hard, practice a lot. Love your job. Be patient. Dive into the technical details” recommended Monnejan from Italdesign.
“Dont forget to pracitce in 3D, not just 2D drawing on paper. Yes, drawing is important, but the world works in 3D”, commented Rice (Pininfarina).
Introduction of Dallara by Dialma Zinelli
Introduction of Ducati by Simone di Piazza
Introduction of Bosch by Mauro Guerrini, Angelo Formenti and Michele Amendolagine
Bosch sees innovation as part of everyone’s job, and employees are evaluated on new ideas they generate every year. They also announced a mobility hackathon they are organizing next week.
Personally I liked a lot to hear about the values that Bosch search in their employees: Make your mark. Find your place. Walk the talk. Be yourself. Balance your life. Discover new directions. You can read about each of those in their website.
See all lectures from the day in the Motor Valley Fest website.
This day was interesting and impressive. It was a little weird to follow this day without a lunch break or coffee break :) The speakers were very optimistic about the future of the Italian Motor Valley and the luxury sport car industry, and I am happy about this fact. The one thing I missed is the engine sound. So here is one car that I didnt yet see in real life (and you can find 100 great movies from all the companies right here). But Maserati has its roots in the early days of racing, but it seems like it has forgotten about those a little bit. I would be very happy to see them find that passion to redevelop a historic model.
