External pressures from falling sales, changing attitudes towards vehicle ownership, entry of tech giants, and expensive development programmes, which can no longer be burdened by a single entity, has started a new phase of close collaboration in Automotive Industry. The companies are now embracing an open innovation culture as a response to these challenges.
Recently the Spanish automobile manufacturer, SEAT joined a multi-sector, public-private open innovation hub. Named Madrid in Motion, the Hub aims to address the challenges of urban mobility by bringing together businesses, public administrations and startups from all over the world, and hence offering innovative solutions that guarantee a positive impact on the future of cities and the lives of their inhabitants.
With the support of the Madrid City Council and the EMT (Madrid’s Municipal Transport Company), Madrid in Motion has the city of Madrid at its epicentre but works to make a global impact. This initiative involves institutions, organisations, leading companies, startups and experts who co-create and combine knowledge and experience through a collaborative system to develop innovations that generate real value and impact on cities and society.
By joining the initiative, SEAT is the first and only manufacturer in the automotive sector present in the project. The brand owned by Volkswagen group is working on strategy to further its 4.0 transformation and to solve joint business challenges that positively impact customers and consumers. Open innovation is one of its cornerstones of the vision, the company is participating in various multi-sector initiatives, such as Madrid in Motion or Start4big, a project promoted by SEAT and 4 other large companies to find the best startups with which to develop transformational technological solutions.
“This is the age of collaboration; we must be agile and disruptive in our way of working” said SEAT Head of Urban Mobility and General Manager of Respiro, SEAT’s car-sharing company, Lucas Casasnovas. “Initiatives such as Madrid in Motion provide us with the ideal platform to pool efforts and creativity with startups, businesses and public administrations so that we can all create sustainable urban mobility together.”
Source: SEAT
