Tailor-made Technology: The stretch of Frugal Innovation in the Truck Industry

At first the current situation of the vehicle industry and the tremendous influence of digitalization technologies for the value chain structure are described. The second part of this paper describes demand side aspects. It becomes clear, that emerging markets have a promising sales potential for trucks in the future. When the described technology developments are brought together with the results of the demand side analysis, it becomes obvious, that there is an increasing gap between the products developed within Europe and the U.S. and the needs of customers within developed and emerging countries. There is a need for frugal innovation and the realization within a comprehensive lifecycle approach to tackle these challenges.