FORM AND FUNCTION Top to bottom: Rowan says sustainability and technology are “baked in” to all its products early on; the Volvo EX30 reveal; and the team behind the EX90.
Volvo cars ceo jim rowan isn’t shying away from an auto industry that is in the midst of great change. In fact, he’s embracing the disruption. But even he will admit, he’s only halfway to where he wants to be on two key fronts: electrification and customer engagement.
“ The industry is in transition. And, of course, so is technology ... We’re halfway through, in our case, the journey toward full electrification, where most of that technology will be harnessed in meaningful ways. And we’re probably about halfway through the full customer engagement journey as well,” Rowan told Newsweek.
As CEO, he has set about revolutionizing the Volvo brand, but he stresses that it has had to happen naturally. That does not mean it will be easy.
“We don’t try and put in sustainability or technology for the sake of technology or sustainability,” Rowan said. “It’s baked in, from the very essence of how that affects the customer, how that benefits the customer, and how that benefits society is all of that comes together very early on at the design stage.”
“You’ve really got to force that. You’ve got to force to make sure that you get that thinking, that you get that collaboration, that you get that cohesiveness right at the very start of the project,” he said.
Those decisions are costing the company money, Rowan told Newsweek last year. “As for the material choices that we’re making … recycled aluminum, recycled steel, recycled plastics, often they’re costing us more money. So, it’s not cost saving, but we’re doing it for the right reasons.”
To offset the costs of using those greener materials, Volvo has found efficiencies elsewhere. The company is using shared vehicle platforms and is engineering vehicles to be simpler but without moving away from the heralded high-quality materials and good aesthetic choices the automaker has become known for. Part of that sustainability plan is building vehicles where they will be sold, rather than at one location and then shipping them around the globe. That practice led the business to become more nimble than most others during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Luckily enough for us we had started a process which was called ‘build where you sell and source where you build’ about four or five years ago. And, that really helped us during the COVID situation because we already had established manufacturing supply chains,” said Rowan, who has a master’s degree in business with a focus in supply chain management and logistics from Northumbria University, northern England.
