The future of car making in Europe will be the central topic of discussion when automotive manufacturing’s senior executives meet in February

The role Eastern Europe will play in this future will also be debated at the Automotive Manufacturing Solutions Europe conference. With the rapidly increasing sophistication of manufacturing in India and China, the Eastern European factories that initially competed on low labour costs will find themselves competing as hard as those further west.

Enhanced collaboration between Eastern and Western European factories could allow both to boost their competitiveness. Western Europe can share its experience of moving to ever more lean production methods, while closer component sourcing relationships will allow economies of scale to be built up across the entire continent.