Digital Transformation in the Automotive Industry: From General Motors to Local Motors, from Exxon to Google

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Abstract:

After water, air and energy, data is considered the new “fuel” of industrial dynamics. That data is also referred to as the "oil" of the digital society has to do with the differentiation of a new industry, whose primary purpose is the generation, analysis and marketing of data. The emergence of this data-based industry has considerable consequences for the “traditional” industries, as for instance in the emergence of new, data-driven markets, products, business models, business organization, occupations and skills and the political and intermediary regulation concerned with this.
The topic “Industry 4.0” represents only one aspect of the transformation of the automotive industry in the form of internet-networked production. The strong focus on the role of the Internet within this line of reasoning ignores the importance of the use of smart, "soft" Robots and the transformation of product and production process by "additive manufacturing", commonly referred to as 3-D printing.
The emergence and development of Local Motors as a new type of company based on additive processes and products in the automotive industry probably represents the most radical departure from the traditional form of production in the automotive industry.
But also the internet-based concepts in the context of the “industrial internet” indicate already significant transformation processes in the automotive industry to the extent that they imply the automation of communication, decision, knowledge and learning in the production of the automotive industry and in other industries. This has important consequences for the abovementioned dimensions of change in the data-based production.
Apart from the Smart Factory the development of autonomous vehicles (Robot Cars) also implies a change in the meaning of functional elements of the vehicle towards data-based control elements and the associated changes of driving and mobility. Here, too, the meaning of different industries for the automotive industry changes, as indicated by the trend of the shift of importance from Exxon to Google to just name one example.
The paper shows that the differentiation of a data-based industry does not only have consequences for product and production processes in the automotive industry, but also for the position of the automotive industry in the ensemble of industries of a data-based society.