The mobility industry is underway: public mass transit systems; shared, leased, and electric cars and motorcycles; bicycles, segways, and scooters, among other innovations, are already present in many cities to offer different options and pose new challenges to the automotive and steel industries.
According to the German consulting company Roland Berger, there will be a third less private cars by 2030, while shared and automated vehicles will comprise 40% of the market. This means that manufacturing safe, efficient, and affordable cars won't be enough, and adapting to new and changing scenarios will be necessary.
The main challenges include stricter controls on fuel efficiency and emissions reduction, as well as adaptations to use the energy and the resources needed during the manufacturing process in the best way possible.
The health and economic crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as the current technological, social, and cultural transformations, demand efficient, accessible, and long-lasting solutions that change the way vehicles are made, sold, and used.
These new necessities demand light, resistant, and repairable materials that minimize the cost of manufacture and maintenance of cars and also offer adaptable solutions to a great variety of users and situations.
Manufacturing safe, efficient, and affordable cars won't be enough; and adapting to new and changing scenarios will also be necessary.
Steel: A Key Element
Steel will be a key element to future mobility. That is why World Auto Steel, the automotive field of the World Steel Association, launched its engineering program called Steel E-Motive, dedicated to designing and testing advanced alloy-based solutions for the new demands of the mobility industry.
Ternium is part of this effort through the research of state-of-the-art steels that will be used in the development of a prototype vehicle, in collaboration with some of the world's leading automakers.
Steel E-Motive will also have the collaboration of Ricardo, a global engineering and environmental consultancy, which will design the vehicle concept to show the industry the advantages of steel over other materials by the end of 2022.
Over the past five years, Ternium has stood out as an automotive steel supplier of the highest quality, with more than 400 certifications. To achieve this, it has undertaken a technological strategy focused on the consolidation as a SMART company (Social, Mobile, Analytics, Robotics and the Internet of Things).
These innovations have led to the digitalization of Ternium processes through the establishment of an effective data flow that optimizes the development of tasks in an efficient and coordinated manner in real-time, accessible from mobile devices through Webservice, a digital services platform that is already used by 80% of its costumers.
To make this technological revolution possible, automated processes are also used in the industrial engineering area, the commercial sector, and credit and accounts area, to streamline production, reduce interruptions and improve productivity, efficiency, and finally, the customer experience.