AD_MAGAZINE_348

11 AutoData | September 2018 “I don’t see much future for the biofuels as the defining of a successful strategy for urban mobility.” hybrid over the electrics. The pure elec- tric vehicle powered by battery, today, is heavier, and that can be a strategic mistake from Rota. I do not see much future for biofuels as the definition of a successful strategy for urban mobility. Is it possible for Brazil to enter this game and be competitive in any of the electric vehicles areas? I believe that everything that has to do with renewable energy generation is im- portant, we have a very great chance at it, generation and accumulation are strategically very important for the futu- re, but we need to invest, to seek for it. We have to understand that the electric vehicle will be present, especially in big cities. Here (in Sorocaba), for example, it’s 80 km away from São Paulo, if you have only one place to charge your car halfway through it, you’re there, andwith extra energy. I think it’s better than forcing a solution that may initially seem better, but may have no future by the fact that we will be small. Are we going to be an island, with a hybrid solution? Will the manufacturers, which are not Brazilian, want to invest to perfect hybrid techno- logy only for Brazil? The trend, when the batteries get improved, in the medium term, is that the hybrid vehicles are more expensive to produce than the electrics. What about the suppliers today? Anyone who wants to stay in this busi- ness will have to think about it. It will not be tomorrow or the day after tomorrow, but those suppliers who want to be in business ten or twenty years from now will have to start thinking about it. The We need an industrial policy that works independent of who is in charge, the decisions have to come from the society. What did you think about Rota 2030? If somehow the program makes the market better I think it is interesting. We are a technology company, whatever in the R&D sense is good. We are al- ready working to bring the first electric powertrains to Brazil, we are quite ad- vanced in that by the way. I think elec- trification will come and it will be quick, especially in big cities, and everything that helps in that direction is interesting. I hope that the measures have an effect in this direction, but I insist that being in the 129th place of that ranking, no way. There is no R&D in the world if there is no favorable business environment. We need to be aligned with new technolo- gies and discover a Brazilian vocation. We do not have a Brazilian automaker. What will impede, for example, that after the Mercosur-EU agreement wewill not start importing much more than export? Wouldn’t the Brazilian vocation be in ethanol? I find it difficult. Let’s talk about China: they changed the rule of the game. They thought, ‘I have a pollution problem, if I will compete with the rest of the world in combustion, I will lose’, so they went off for electrification. Ethanol is only here. Who else in the world did we convince that this is good? Ok, China uses 20%, but this is now, not for the future. Brazil will have to understand that combus- tion engine technologies are palliative. Perhaps a failure of Rota is to favor the