Czech car industry readies for an electric future

Shake-up of the sector, due to the rise of electric mobility, is pitting suppliers against each otherA worker operates a mixer of fused aluminium. Picture: REUTERS

But the upgrades that cost millions of dollars represent more than the success of a well-run midsize business. Executives see them as a matter of life and death in a cut-throat industry gripped by existential dread. The Czech Republic and Slovakia, its former federation partner, make more cars per person than any other country in the world. The vast web of component-makers employs almost twice as many people as the car factories themselves.

“We are now in quite a dangerous period,” Petr Knap, an EY partner in Prague, told a gathering of auto-industry executives on November 12. “For the next two or three years, things may be evolving. But then we may see big disruptions.” The Czech government estimates that about 40,000 jobs depend on the combustion engine, requiring programmes to retrain at least some of those workers for electric platforms.

“Now they want us to change the whole industry,” said Robert Kiml, a senior manager at the Czech operation of Toyota Peugeot Citroën Automobile. “Of course, we’re scared. Our suppliers have no clarity whether their business and investments are going to pay off.”

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