The transportation market is set for a dramatic change by 2030, according to experts from the PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), with gains in China offset by falls in Europe and the United States.
Collected together under the “eascy – The five dimensions of automotive transformation” report, the data found that more than one in three kilometers driven will be shared in the years to come, due to the rising prevalence of low-cost charing concepts. At the same time, personal mileage is set to rise by 23 percent in Europe, 24 percent in the United States and 183 percent in China. Vehicles, themselves, could plummet by as many as 80 million vehicles in Europe and nearly 60 million more in the United States over the same period. In China, however, that same inventory could rise by 100 million vehicles.
“The various different trends will reinforce each other,” Christoph Stürmer, Global Lead Analyst at PwC Autofacts, said. “For instance, electric vehicles are less susceptible to failure thanks to their simpler power train – which is a significant advantage where vehicles are being shared and used more intensively. Self-driving cars, in turn, could effectively become ‘robotaxis’ if they are combined with sharing concepts.”
A result of this is that sharing will coincide with a rise of self-driving cars, and as many as 55 percent of all new vehicles could be electric vehicles by 2030, heralding a nail in the coffin of the conventional combustion engine. Building on that, roughly 40 percent of mileage driven could be undertaken by autonomous vehicles by then.
Of concern amidst this information is that, while numbers of vehicles might be down, road traffic could actually rise. Self-driving cars will see more mobility for people that cannot drive themselves today, and if there are robotaxis created, there will also be more empty trips as such automated vehicles shuffle between points. Stürmer is not worried about this, though, saying that despite the increased traffic, a similar increase in connectivity will make the traffic easier to organize and navigate.
As many as one-third more new registrations could be seen by 2024. It will be good news for manufacturers and suppliers, who will need to up production and development capacity. At the same time, it could tax them, because those vehicles will need to be highly specialized and produced at lower prices.
“Automotive groups and their suppliers will have to make critical decisions in the years ahead,” Stürmer said. On the one hand, while they will have to contend with falling margins – mainly due to pressure from the major fleet operators – at the same time they will have to significantly increase their investment in new factories, electro-mobility, and the other megatrends.”
This could, in turn, open the market to new opportunities for competition.