Italian Car Research Articles

Competition and the Green Deal: a Study of Consumers’ WTP for CO2 Emissions Reduction in the Italian Car Market

Competition and the Green Deal: a Study of Consumers’ WTP for CO2 Emissions Reduction in the Italian Car Market

The Impact of Automobile Design on Architecture

AbstractPaolo Pininfarina, chairman of longstanding Italian car designer and maker Pininfarina, and Paolo Trevisan, Head of Design and Architecture at Pininfarina of America, describe how the seamless, double‐curved formal transitions made in automobile design can be transferable to architecture, and question the discrete separateness of building elements and techniques, for example roofs and walls, as illustrated by their Cyrela residential tower block in São Paulo.

Nostalgia and pastiche in the post-postmodern zeitgeist: The ‘postcar’ from Italy

The transition towards a post-postmodern zeitgeist has attracted much scholarly attention over the last decade, highlighting the major traits of the coming post-postmodern condition, such as sincerity challenging irony, reconstruction despite paradoxes, hope despite difficult circumstances and structure counterbalancing anti-structure in lived experience. Nevertheless, we know little about what is happening with regard to nostalgia, a key characteristic of postmodernity, especially in terms of one of its major components, pastiche. From the start of the 1990s, marketing research on postmodern nostalgia and pastiche has largely focused on different models of cars. Through an interpretive analysis focusing on the dual comeback of an Italian car, the Giulia, this article aims to investigate the existence and forms that nostalgia and pastiche take under the new zeitgeist. It highlights a mutation of nostalgia that is becoming regenerative. The major consequence of this is the changing nature of pastiche, from stylistic to essentialist. Our understanding of the coming zeitgeist has also improved: in addition to confirming the major features of post-postmodernity already established in the literature, this study argues that the possibility of a (mini)miracle is another key feature of our times.

Discussion of Elective Sonolucent Cranioplasty for Real-Time Ultrasound Monitoring of Flow and Patency of an Extra- to Intracranial Bypass.

Discussion of Elective Sonolucent Cranioplasty for Real-Time Ultrasound Monitoring of Flow and Patency of an Extra- to Intracranial Bypass.

Dissecting the total cost of ownership of fully electric cars in Italy: The impact of annual distance travelled, home charging and urban driving

The paper quantifies the importance for cost competitiveness of fully electric cars (BEVs) of three determinants of the total cost of ownership (TCO): the annual distance travelled (ADT), the percentage of urban trips, and the availability of a private parking space. The estimates are performed with reference to the Italian car market. We find that charging at home increases the break-even BEV manufacturer's suggested retail price (MSRP) relative to other propulsion systems by €2866-11,466, depending on the ADT. Driving in urban areas increases the break-even BEV MSRP by €910-10,314, depending on the ADT and on the referenced propulsion system. Taking into account the share of Italian drivers who own a garage and drive in urban areas, we find the cheapest BEVs are cost competitive without a subsidy with respect to the HEVs for 11.8% of the Italian drivers, but not with respect to the diesel and petrol cars, unless extremely high annual distances are driven. With the purchase subsidy recently introduced by the Italian government, the cheapest BEVs become competitive also with respect to the diesel cars, but not relative to the petrol cars, unless more than 12,500 km are annually driven.

Consumers’ willingness to pay for green cars: a discrete choice analysis in Italy

In September 2015, the Volkswagen Group was involved in a massive scandal regarding vehicles’ emissions of substances harmful to the environment. This scandal, known as Dieselgate, caused a commotion in the automotive sector and raised the question of whether or not there exists consumer demand for cleaner cars. This paper aims to investigate consumers’ willingness to pay a premium price for lower CO2 emitting cars. To do so, it adopts a discrete choice methodological approach and an exploratory survey involving 278 potential Italian car buyers. The results provide strong support for the primary hypothesis of the research that consumers are willing to pay more for cleaner vehicles, as expressed by a positive marginal willingness to pay for lower emissions. Potential car buyers indeed appear willing to pay a price premium of about € 2100 for a 20% CO2 reduction per kilometre from the current standard level that car industry has to comply with. In particular, we estimate a willingness to pay approximately € 88 for 1-g of CO2 reduction per kilometre (with a 95% confidence interval ranging between € 54 and € 122).

Explaining Organizational Paths through the Concept of Hegemony: Evidence from the Italian Car Industry

By analysing the Fiat case, we contextualize path-dependence processes within the relations of production and propose a neo-Gramscian interpretation of the agency-structure interplay within path-dependent phenomena based on the distinction between structural hegemony and hegemonic projects. Building upon recent developments in understanding institutional complexity, we treat agency as embedded within, yet separated from, self-reinforcements that are generated by multiple competing logics. The aim is to deepen our understanding of the relationship between collective agency and the emergence of meta-routines in the pre-formation phase of the path-dependence process, and their interaction with self-reinforcements in the formation and lock-in phases.

Made in Italy: rethinking a century of Italian design

Introduction: The History of Italian Design, Kjetil Fallan, University of Oslo, Norway, and Grace Lees-Maffei, University of Hertfordshire, UK 1. A Historiography of Italian Design, Maddalena Dalla Mura, Libera Universita di Bolzano, Italy, and Carlo Vinti, Universita degli Studi di Camerino, Italy PART 1: ACTORS 2. Ettore Sottsass and Critical Design in Italy, 1965-1985, Penny Sparke, Kingston University, UK 3. Domes to Domus (or how Roberto Mango brought the geodesic dome to the home of Italian design), Jeffrey T. Schnapp, Harvard University, USA 4. Tomas Maldonado and the Impact of the HfG Ulm in Italy, Raimonda Riccini, Universita Iuav di Venezia, Italy PART 2: CRAFTS 5. Craft, Industry and Art: ISIA (1922-1943) and the Roots of Italian Design Education, Elena Dellapiana, Politecnico di Torino, Italy, and Daniela Prina, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium 6. Manufactured Identities: Ceramics and the Making of (Made in) Italy, Lisa Hockemeyer, Politecnico di Milano, Italy, and Kingston University, UK 7. Crafting a Design Counterculture: the Pastoral and the Primitive in Italian Radical Design, 1972-1976, Catharine Rossi, Kingston University, UK PART 3: SPACES 8. Private Exhibitions: Galleries, Art and Interior Design, 1920-1960, Imma Forino, Politecnico di Milano, Italy 9. Exhibiting Exhibitions: Designing and Displaying Fascism, Vanessa Rocco, Southern New Hampshire University, USA 10. This Way to the Exit: The Re-Writing of the City through Graphic Design (1964-1989), Gabriele Oropallo, University of Oslo, Norway PART 4: INDUSTRIES 11. Designing a New Society: A Social History of Italian Car Design, Federico Paolini, Seconda Universita degli Studi di Napoli, Italy 12. Espresso by Design: The Creation of the Italian Coffee Machine, Jonathan Morris, University of Hertfordshire, UK 13. Italian Fashion: The Metamorphosis of a Cultural Industry, Simona Segre Reinach, Universita di Bologna, Italy PART 5: MEDIATIONS 14. Annus Mirabilis: 1954, Alberto Rosselli and the Institutionalization of Design Mediation, Kjetil Fallan, University of Oslo, Norway 15. A Vehicle for 'Good Italians': User Design and the Vespa Clubs in Italy, Thomas Brandt, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway 16. 'Made' in England? The Mediation of Alessi S.p.A., Grace Lees-Maffei, University of Hertfordshire, UK Notes on Contributors List of Illustrations Bibliography Index

FIAT Goes it Alone: the Italian Car Industry, the Government and the Crisis of the 2000s

After decades of public aid, FIAT went into the 2000s without help from the state. While this initially threatened to lead to bankruptcy, it subsequently proved a key factor in the company's transformation from a national into a global player. Its ties with the state, formerly viewed as a means of survival and development, have gradually loosened, and FIAT has begun an autonomous process of expansion which has given it a new structural power to shift investment and production from Italy towards countries offering better conditions and favourable enterprise policies. The present article analyses this process, FIAT's change in strategy with regard to the government, and the possible consequences of a downsizing in Italy of what is now the nation's only multinational manufacturing company.

Ergonomics and workplace design: application of Ergo-UAS System in Fiat Group Automobiles

Since 2008 Fiat Group Automobiles has introduced Ergo-UAS system for the balancing of production lines and to detect ergonomic issues. Ergo-UAS system integrates 2 specific methods: MTM-UAS for time measurement and EAWS as ergonomic method to evaluate biomechanical effort for each workstation. Fiat is using a software system to manage time evaluation and ergo characterization of production cycle (UAS) to perform line balancing and obtain allowance factor in all Italian car manufacturing plant. For new car models, starting from New Panda, FGA is applying Ergo-UAS for workplace design since the earliest phase of product development. This means that workplace design is based on information about new product, new layout, new work organization and is performed by a multidisciplinary team (Work Place Integration Team), focusing on several aspects of product and process: safety, quality and productivity. This allows to find and solve ergonomic threats before the start of production, by means of a strict cooperation between product development, engineering and design, manufacturing. Three examples of workstation design are presented in which application of Ergo-UAS was determinant to find out initial excessive levels of biomechanical load and helped the process designer to improve the workstations and define limits of acceptability. Technical activities (on product or on process), or organizational changes, that have been implemented in order to solve the problems are presented. A comparison between "before" and "new" ergonomic scores necessary to bring workstations in acceptable conditions were made.

Surviving in the Global Market: ‘Americanisation’ and the Relaunch of Italy's Car Industry after the Second World War

AbstractThis contribution sheds light on the successful recovery strategies developed by the Italian car industry after the Second World War and in particular the ‘innovation through creative imitation policy’ that characterised its relationship with American producers. This policy was feasible because the Italian car sector, and Fiat in particular, was fairly well prepared to measure itself against the American model and aimed at technology-transfer-based Americanisation in order to make itself competitive in the global market. Mass production adapted to Italian plants and necessities, combined with Italian style and design, was seen as a path towards international relaunch. Fiat's subsequent development of its own technological resources and innovation strategy enabled it to weather the ups and downs of its long-term business history. When in 2009 an alliance with Chrysler was signed, Fiat's technological capabilities in the field of innovative ecological and fuel-saving technology and its long-standing attention to style and interior design were judged important inputs to help the American car-maker (and Fiat itself) to survive in the global market.

Information sharing, market competition and antitrust intervention: a lesson from the Italian insurance sector

By means of an application of the Rosse–Panzar methodology, we assess the degree of competition in the Italian car insurance market in order to evaluate the considerable fine that is imposed on 39 companies by the Italian Antitrust Authority (IAA) in 2000 for their supposed anticompetitive behaviour due to a longstanding information exchange through a third independent company. Our results show that this group of firms has earned revenues as if under monopoly or collusive oligopoly conditions, therefore endorsing the decision of IAA.

Fiat Restructuring and the Pomigliano Case: A New Era in Italian Industrial Relations?

Between late 2009 and early 2010, Fiat, the Italian car manufacturer, announced two developments as part of its long-term restructuring plan. One plant, located in Termini Imerese, Sicily, was going to be closed by the end of 2011. A second plant, in Pomigliano d’Arco, near Naples, was going to be revamped through an investment of 700 million euros. Part of the once-relocated production was going to be brought back to Pomigliano from Poland.

La crisi del settore automobilistico e le misure di sostegno dei paesi industrializzati

- In 2008 new car registrations in the European Union with 14.7 million vehicles, marked a decline of 2.1 million units, compared to the previous year. The sharp fall in new vehicle registrations in January ( 40%) confirmed the impact of the economic crisis on the Italian car market, causing a major alert for the potential consequences on this sector's employment. The alarming situation of the car sector has led all EU governments to approve both industry support measures and demand incentives for consumers. The latter, in particular, are motivated by the downward trend in consumer purchase of durable goods, mainly attributed to both income level and increasing uncertainty. In the early weeks of 2009, car firms have temporarily shut down some of their facilities while the parking lots for the storage of new vehicles are full of unsold cars. The present article briefly describes the Italian and global car market, with an eye to the more-or-less induced, technological developments. It also includes a forecast for the coming years and a synthetic picture of the State support measures in some EU countries and in the United States. Finally, it summarizes the main opinions about the recent initiatives. Keywords: car industry, subsidies, incentives, technology development, natural gas Vehicles Parole chiave: industria automobilistica, sussidi, incentivi, sviluppo tecnologico, veicoli a gas naturale Jel Classification: H20, L62, L98, Q58

Information Exchange as a Means of Collusion: The Case of the Italian Car Insurance Market

This paper employs an econometric methodology (the Panzar-Rosse H-statistic) to test the level of competition in the Italian car insurance market, where in 2000 the Antitrust Authority imposed a conspicuous fine on 39 companies for their anti-competitive behavior deriving from an ad hoc information exchange from 1994 onwards. Our set of results shows that during the years 1998–2003 the group of firms whose business in the motor segment exceeds 60% of total gross premiums has earned revenues as if it were under monopoly or collusive oligopoly conditions, and therefore appears to support the decision of the Antitrust Authority.

Simulating information ambiguity during new product development: a forecasting model using system dynamics

This paper presents an approach useful to analyse the performance of the product development model adopted by an organisation. A dynamic information management perspective of the development process was assumed while the nature of the information and knowledge flows exchanged to coordinate tasks was the primary focus of this study. In particular, the effect of information and knowledge flows ambiguity was taken into account. Coordination between tasks was modelled by using the Design Structure Matrix (DSM) tool. The dynamic behaviour of the Product Development Process (PDP) and the evolution of information and knowledge quality at the interface between tasks was foresighted through simulation. System dynamics was used as a modelling framework. This approach was implemented to analyse a specific subsystem - 'the climatic system' - of a new car model recently developed by a large Italian car manufacturer. Data were collected by administrating a questionnaire to technical managers and engineers involved in the development process of the subsystem. Continuous interaction and feedback from them was useful to build the process model simulated in our study and to test scales to measure model variables developed for the purpose in the first part of the study and discuss the simulation outcome and possible organisational solutions to correct bad performance.

Counterfactuals, superfactuals and the problematic relationship between business management and the past

This article analyses counterfactuals and superfactuals as means to develop scenarios, by focusing on the relationship between the design of heuristic tools for decision-making and the analysis of an organization’s past. It therefore addresses the questions whether and to what extent the ex-post analysis of the past can help us to understand the present and take ex-ante strategic decisions. The Fiat case is analysed, by focusing on how the Italian carmaker responded to expected changes in the structure of the Italian and EC car markets from 1970 onwards. A counterfactual will be explored to hypothesize what might have happened, had the Fiat management developed a superfactual on the basis of the company’s evolutionary patterns each time a change in the output mix was planned. Finally, the article puts forward a simple scenario for Fiat’s future.

An empirical analysis of enterprises' behaviours within the Italian car market using technical features and prices

The main aim of the paper is to propose an analysis involving prices and technical features of cars in order to obtain an empirical model revealing firms' behaviours in the marketplace. Such a type of approach seems justified by the fact that both of these variables (prices and technical specifications) are the uniquely available and fully appraisable information to an external observer/analyst. As a matter of fact, retail prices are directly found in published market lists, while the summa of technical specifications (even if it comes after an appropriated calculation) can be synthesised into a single figure by using data reported within specialised magazines. The results revealed by the retrieved information applying this model can be helpful both for managers and scholars in interpreting market behaviours of major enterprises, considering that both the growing complexity and the increasing international competition among players are the more defining aspects of current markets and related industries.

Thermal and microchemical investigation of automotive brake pad wear residues

By means of the combined use of simultaneous differential thermal analysis and thermogravimetry (DTA–TG) and scanning electron microscopy+energy dispersive spectrometry (SEM+EDS), the thermal and microchemical investigation of an automotive wear brake pad and its residues produced during the long service of a largely used Italian car, is carried out. The wear residues are produced during braking as the pad releases microscopic debris from the contact surface due to the combination of friction induced heat and mechanical actions such as attrition and wear. The results of SEM+EDS characterisation combined with the results of the thermal behaviour study, show the chemical and physical changes induced in the microchemical structure of the pad during braking and further, allow to measure the surface contact temperature at the interface between brake pad and metallic counter-face that does not exceed 720 °C.

The nature of buyer‐supplier relationships in co‐design activities

The nature of buyer‐supplier relationships has been closely linked to nation specific explanations and concern has been expressed in literature regarding the transferability of co‐design best practices to different firms and countries. On the other hand, many attempts to isolate best practices and to apply them on a global scale have been proposed in the literature. Contributes to the issue by analysing a controversial case study based on the Italian automotive industry. Results show that few aspects of the Japanese contextual features and American ones existed when the major Italian car maker decided to outsource component design and dramatically change its supply chain management approach. Moreover, despite the massive involvement of suppliers at a very early stage of the car maker new product development process, not all the best practices deemed to be necessary when implementing a co‐operative buyer‐supplier relationship have been applied. Argues that these results lead us to question the very nature of effective buyer‐supplier relationships as described by the dominant literature and suggests implications for practitioners and for future research.