Hi Sethu,

The main player in the automotive industry are a limited number of Groups which own all the brands you may have heard of (e.g. VW, Audi, Jaguar, etc). Most of the groups use different brands to penetrate different markets in different geographies (e.g. family cars in the US, sport cars in europe...).

Behind these groups there is a multitude of OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturers) which produces the main cars components (e.g. ABS, brakes, etc...)

At the moment automation players are increasing their effort to reduce the production cost through:

- Rationalization of their product portfolio (i.e. standardization of cars components to generate sinergies among different models)

- Reduction of stored part volumes through the development of a "justy in time" supply chain

- Improvement of OEM purchasing strategies through demand aggregation and imrpovement of negotiation techinque

In addition to that there is a long lasting run for innovation on few main topics (e.g. electric cars, autonomous cars, etc). Yet no dominant design has been defined on any of these topics.

Hope this may help,

In case you have any doubt please don't hesitate to contact me,

Thanks,

Ale