iDNES.cz: China's electric car wave will overwhelm Europe, warns analysis

The driving force of the electric car market is no longer Europe or the United States, but China. It is now trying to push its production into Europe, but the European current production infrastructure is not capable to face the challenge. While the debate about electric cars is mainly limited to environmental friendliness and price for consumers, the future of global competition is often neglected. This is what our researchers Vít Havelka and Michal Hrubý point out in a new analysis on electromobility. To safeguard its automotive industry, Europe needs to work on improving its battery production capacities, as well as its supply chains for primary raw materials, the experts say.

"If the EU and individual member states do not support the production capacities of European concerns, the construction of infrastructure and battery factories, there is a risk that European automakers will be overtaken by competition from China, including in the Czech Republic," says Vít Havelka.

"China has become an automotive, battery and mining power over the last 20 years. But in contrast to the way we are turning our backs on Russia in the EU today, we are turning to China. Or rather, we have already turned to China. We must now do everything we can to maintain our relative position in the automotive industry, especially through modern technologies such as batteries, chips and fuel cells. It is also the individual countries that can create the right "domestic" conditions for international companies (such as Volkwagen) to develop new production and value chains," adds Michal Hrubý.

You can read the full article (in Czech) here. 

Michal Hrubý
Research Fellow

Expertise: EU green economics, heavy industry, transport

Vít Havelka
Senior Research Fellow

Expertise: EU institutional relations with member states, europeisation, transformation role of EU