Since several years the automotive industry has been facing challenges, such as changing customer behaviors, changing regulation and politics and introducing new technologies. In addition since 2020 COVID-19 has caused crucial problems for the entire global economy. Recently the shortage in the supply chain forced automotive industry to stop the production which caused huge problems & losses at OEMs and suppliers. Now the automotive industry is struggling with several challenges at the same time. In order to get the practical insights from the expert the virtual expert talk “The “perfect storm” in the automotive industry, facing multiple challenges at the same time.” took place. As the guest speaker Mr. Klaus Müller, MBA, Head of Transmission & Engine Sensors, Vitesco Technologies & Alumnus of MBA Automotive Industry Program shared the actual insights in the automotive industry such as the technology disruption, pandemic crisis and the shortage of the supply chain in the automotive industry.

Mrs. Purrucker, Head of Management School welcomed Mr. Müller and guests. After short introduction about the Continuing Education Center of the TU Wien Mr. Müller started that there are more than one actual topics in the automotive industry. There are big changes in the automotive market based on the perception of mobility, climate change, diesel gate and disruptive technological changes. Today’s cars are lead toward software defined vehicles which has a function defined architecture with significant computing power and connections. In addition to the Electronics and software as well as system integration the value of the vehicle depends on software maintenance, new features and functions and cloud services.  The sustainability is becoming a global movement, because the climate is a major concern. The main focus is to reduction of CO₂. He explained the targets of governments to phase-out the fossil fuel vehicle, the OEM’s approach for all-electric passenger vehicle line-up and what is the right powertrain for the climates. Meeting such challenges he gave suggestions how suppliers balance the change of technologies. The suppler need to renew the portfolio to balance between the cash flow for the running business and the innovation management for future business. The pandemic crisis has been caused the huge impact in the automotive industry which caused to lose almost one year car production from 2020 to 2024. During pandemic crisis the company took measures to mitigate the impacts, such as protection of employee, protection of business and protection of future. As the last part of his talk he talked about the shortages in the supply chain especially semi-conductor and resin.  The pandemic crisis has similar profile such as that of in 2008/2009. The automotive industry missed the fast recovery of other industries, such as IT Industry. Because of the pandemic crisis there were massive demand on the semiconductor the IT Devices. Additionally the ice storm in February 2021 in Texas causes the shortage of resin in the supply chain. He concluded his talk with recommendations to master such storm to know conditions, to recognize causalities, draw conclusions, and to trust team.

The TU Wien Academy would like to thank Mr. Klaus Müller for practical insights in the current automotive and supply industry.  

The MBA Automotive Industry Program, , öffnet eine externe URL in einem neuen Fenster, opens an external URL in a new windowstarts on June 7, 2021.

*) To celebrate the positive outlook to a hopefully near end of the pandemic, we are offering a special post-Covid 15% discount for last minute participants for the program start on June 7, 2021.

More Information about the MBA Program: >>,, öffnet eine externe URL in einem neuen Fenster, opens an external URL in a new window

Contact:
Dr. Man-Wook Han
Tel: +43(0)1/58801-41712
Email: mba(at)tuwien.ac.at