Page 12 - BNE_magazine_04_2019

12 I Companies & Markets bne April 2019
“Some are questioning whether CEE can handle the EVs if they come – and this announcement proves that we can,” said Peter Badik, co-founder and managing partner of GreenWay, in October. “GreenWay has built the core infrastructure providing comprehensive, trans-national coverage in Slovakia and Poland, as well as the backend IT and support services drivers need. We have many more plans. We will continue to add more chargers and constantly be innovating to make EV driving as seamless and comfortable as possible and provide excellent customer service.”
Polish petrol retailer PKN ORLEN, meanwhile, plans to roll out 150 fast charging stations across the country’s largest cities and on selected transit routes. ABB will to supply its latest
“Fast charging along corridors and highways is essential for drivers to complete journeys beyond the range of their vehicle”
multi-standard fast charger, Terra 54, to PKN ORLEN, which expects to complete the first phase of the project, with around 50 fast-charging stations, by the end of this year.
In Romania, German retailer Kaufland Romania and Renovatio Group launched the first fast charging hub for electric cars in the country at one of Kaufland’s Bucharest stores in 2018. This followed Kaufland’s launch of the
first electric car fast charging public stations network in Romania two years earlier, also alongside Renovatio. Mol and E.ON have also been rolling out EV charging stations in Romania.
Adapting supply chains
As a centre for automotive assembly and components manufacturing, the CEE region is involved in the supply chains for the growing EV market.
Czech Skoda Auto's first electric cars will be presented already this year: the Superb plug-in hybrid and Citigo electric. In 2020, the first serial models on MEB (Modularer Elektrifizierungsbaukasten) platforms will be produced, including serial version of Vision iV. Overall, the Czech car manufacturer plans to introduce more than 30 new models by the end of 2022, of which at least ten will electrified, said the chairman of the board of directors Bernhard Maier at the international Geneva Motor Show, daily online Hospodarske Noviny reported on March 4.
Hungary has had a series of recent investments into EVs. German carmaker Audi launched serial production of electric motors at its base in Gyor, northwest Hungary in July 2018, expanding its product portfolio. By 2025, the electronic version of all Audi models will be available, it was announced.
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BMW's €1bn new plant in Hungary, its first new production facility in Europe in 20 years, will have capacity to turn out 150,000 conventional and electric vehicles annually from 2023. Hungary, along with other CEE states such as Poland and Slovakia, is an important centre for the automotive industry, where last year Audi, Mercedes, Suzuki, and Opel turned out a total of some 500,000 cars or 2.8% of the 19mn cars manufactured in the EU.
Also in Hungary, fellow German industrial group Robert Bosch announced a HUF14bn (€43.6mn) investment at
its automotive industry factory in the northeastern part of the country. At the time of the announcement, in January 2019, the 200 millionth product was manufactured at the Miskolc plant, an iBooster electromechanical brake booster, which makes the motors of hybrid and electric vehicles more efficient.
Elsewhere in the region, Slovenia’s TPV, a supplier for the automotive industry, signed deals with Sweden’s Volvo in December to become one of the key suppliers of Volvo Cars in the field of electrification. The deals include the development and production of structural chassis and automobile bodywork with the function of supporting and protecting electric power.
ON Semiconductor opened a new, expanded product development centrein the Slovak capital Bratislava in 2017. Technology produced at the Bratislava Development Center will be incorporated into the powertrains of EVs, hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) and conventional combustion engine cars to help improve fuel economy and safety levels.
And there have also been investments outside of the
main CEE manufacturing hubs. Chinese electric vehicles company Cenntro Automotive Corporation and its partners from Luxembourg and Bulgaria will invest €10mn in an assembly plant to produce electric utility vehicles in the Thracian economic zone near the city of Plovdiv, daily Dnevnik reported back in July.
Belarus and China are also in negotiations over possible joint production of electric cars, Belarusian Industry Minister Pavel Utyupin told a government meeting in February. This came several months after the Belarusian government said that China is interested in assembling electric cars at the BelGee factory in the East European country.
Also not to be forgotten is the region’s homegrown champion in the EV field: Croatian electric sports car company Rimac Automobili. The company grew out of its founder Mate Rimac's hobby of building and racing electric cars, which began after he converted his BMW 3 Series into an electric car, as bne IntelliNews reported in 2016 following an interview with the company. Today, Rimac Automobili, based in Sveta Nedjelja,
a small town near Zagreb, provides technological solutions and components to a wide range of successful car manufacturers across the globe, and – confirming its success in the field –
in 2018 Porsche AG took a 10% stake in the company.