Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
the industry rather than from a single ac-
tor's influence.
different kind of strategic moves: incre-
mental (Toyota), holistic (Renault-Nissan),
sharp and prospective-oriented (Honda),
etc. In a whole, the diversity of business
models cannot prevent car industry play-
ers from being impacted by the potential
capture of margin by new players at both
downstream (electricity delivery, etc.) and
upstream (battery, etc.) levels. By taking
environmental constrains into account in
their business model, they are implicitly
pushing government and regulators to help
them going through the low-carbon tran-
sition and establishing new entry-market
barriers for the “new guys on the block”.
•
The oil sector considers the low-carbon
transition in a quite conservative way,
leading to strategies that remain highly
path-dependent. The social and regulatory
pressure and, in some specific cases, in-
ternal leadership convictions have pushed
oil companies to diversify activities and
invest in alternative energies, including
renewable power production. However,
many other factors act as pull-back forces
backing a conservative vision of the tran-
sition: prospects for strong demand pulled
by emerging economies, heavy capital as-
sets, huge profits, no global international
agreement to move collectively to decar-
bonise the economy, etc. This created little
incentives for companies to bet on a mas-
sive transformation of the downstream us-
ages of oil, in particular in transport, and
correlatively, to revise their core-business
so as to influence the realization of a low
carbon transition.
A Comparison of the three selected indus-
tries shows that car industry appears to be more
advanced in the way to envisage the low-carbon
transition compared to oil and outdoor sportswear
industry. For more than three decades, car industry
has indeed developed a partnership culture to be
able to maintain its margin both at the upstream and
downstream level along the entire supply-chain. In
particular, the emergence of India and China has
been decisive. It led the industry to anticipate the
need to adapt to new strategic levers at upstream
(suppliers) and downstream (market) levels now
located in emerging economies. It pushed to move
to innovations, including the EV that seems to
be inherent of the transport development policy
in China, mostly to answer energy security and
health issues than in anticipation to a low carbon
economy. Car industry has been more proactive
to develop innovative low carbon technology. If
it answered first the competitive pressure, some
companies are now anticipating a new economic
paradigm: they invest not only on technology but
also on mobility and urban considerations, with
new partnerships.
Car industry is starting to implement a holistic
approach, whereas still incomplete and sometimes
opportunist, in opposition to the oil or sportswear
•
Car industry are quite proactive, which
is a recent trend, strengthened by Toyota
success with Prius. The profitability of the
Prius project led constructors to compete
for the leadership to seize the mid and lon-
ger term opportunities linked to low-car-
bon transition and post-carbon economy.
The globalization of car industry's supply
chain with associated delocalizations and
social concerns, the rapid emergence of
China's and India's entrants into the mar-
kets, the growing volatilities of raw mate-
rial and oil prices had a decisive impact
on the way Western car manufacturers
conceive environmental issues. The re-
cent crisis with all difficulties encountered
by US car manufacturers (the Big Three),
has intensified this challenging global di-
agnosis. Car industry's players operate
