Perception in driverless vehicles; aftersales in Spain and trends; alternatives to electrification in vehicles and the future of an aging vehicle fleet are the topics to be examined in the 19th edition of the Universidad Católica de Ávila CESVIMAP Chair Lecture Series.
With the title 20/20 Trends, Fernando García, visiting professor at the Universidad Carlos III, spoke about vehicle perception systems, which enable the vehicles to know and understand what is going on around them and inside them. He commented on the advances in perception systems – cameras, radars and laser scaners – which have made it possible to move forwards towards the creation of intelligent and autonomous vehicles. Likewise, he showed the main challenges for the upcoming years, to succeed in bringing this technology to our roads with full security and reliability.
José Armenteros, president of After Market Club, AMC, presented the mobility model studied in the “White Paper for Aftersales in Spain”. Through relevant variables on the automobile – number of registrations, accidentability, vehicle fleet, number of repairs… – a recovery is foreseen in real invoice volume of the combined total for automobile sales and aftersales for the period 2017-2025, until it reaches the maximum levels attained at the height of the building bubble in 2007.
Javier Arboleda, Service Senior Manager at Hyundai, spoke about the energy and environmental motivation of the manufacturer for the electrification of vehicles. He took us on an interesting tour, studying the wide range of technical alternatives which are available: hybrids, plug-in hybrids, purely electrical, and fuel battery-powered.
Lastly, José Luis Gata, in charge of the post-sales market at Solera, shared with the auditorium the consequences of having a vehicle fleet as old as the Spanish one (in 2022, more than 40% of the vehicles will be over 15 years old, as opposed to the current 30%).