{"id":34648,"date":"2019-03-16T15:04:19","date_gmt":"2019-03-16T07:04:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/?p=34648"},"modified":"2019-03-16T15:04:20","modified_gmt":"2019-03-16T07:04:20","slug":"ficosa-turns-70-announces-e500m-investment-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/2019\/03\/16\/ficosa-turns-70-announces-e500m-investment-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"Ficosa turns 70, announces \u20ac500M investment plan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Ficosa, a provider devoted to the research, development, manufacturing and marketing of vision, safety, connectivity and efficiency systems for the automotive sector, is celebrating its 70<\/strong><sup><strong>th<\/strong><\/sup><strong> anniversary with a commitment to new technology for more assisted driving, autonomous cars, connected cars and e-mobility to lead the current transformation of the automobile.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The history of\nFicosa began in 1949 when Josep Pujol Sucarrats supported his son and current\npresident of the company, Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Pujol, in founding a small workshop in\nBarcelona with Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Tarrag\u00f3, called Pujol y Tarrag\u00f3, which manufactured\nmechanical cables for the spare parts market. Over the following seven decades,\na firm commitment to innovation and internationalisation have made Ficosa the\nglobal benchmark in the automotive and mobility sector, with more than 10,500 employees\nin 19 countries in Europe, North and South America, Asia and Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the words of\nJavier Pujol, Ficosa CEO: \u201cOne of the keys to our success lies in our ability\nover the years to anticipate future changes, in conjunction with our clear\ncommitment to innovation. This has led us to transform the company to get out\nahead of changes, whether for example being pioneers in going beyond Spanish\nborders in the 1970s or diversifying our line of products to meet market needs.\nLikewise, the secret of our success can also be found in our philosophy of\ndoing a lot with very little, our solid human values of humility, hard work and\nentrepreneurship, and the great team that has made up this company at the\nvarious points throughout its history.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The new\ntechnological products aimed at more assisted driving, autonomous cars,\nconnected cars and e-mobility have become the pillars of Ficosa\u2019s growth. In\nrecent years, the company has implemented a significant plan for investment in\nnew technology, which will be further bolstered with an additional \u20ac500 million\nover the next four years, in order to fuel its leadership in areas that are\ndecisive for the automobile of the future. The company, which saw \u20ac1.28 billion\nin revenue in 2017 and invested nearly 8% of its sales in R&amp;D, expects\nrevenue from technology systems to go from \u20ac100 million to \u20ac800 million over the\nnext five years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ficosa has\ndeveloped and manufactured the Audi e-Tron\u2019s digital rear-view system, the\nfirst vehicle to market with this technology composed of cameras and screens\ninstead of the conventional exterior mirrors. This project is a turning point\nin the technological transformation of the company and reaffirms its leadership\nin vision systems, marking a milestone in the automotive industry worldwide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In late 2018,\nFicosa reaffirmed its commitment to electromobility by inaugurating its new e-Mobility\nHub, a pioneering centre in Spain and the world in technology for electric\nmobility. Located in Viladecavalls, it employs 120 engineers and will become a\nglobal benchmark laboratory in the development of electromobility systems for\nhybrid and electric vehicles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Pujol highlights:\n\u201cAs part of our DNA, Ficosa\u2019s evolution has always been closely tied to the\ntransformation of the automobile. Some years ago, we set our sights on\ntechnological products with high value added for the automobile and made a firm\ncommitment to our transformation. The digital rear-view system and the new\ne-Mobility hub are clear examples that, once more in Ficosa\u2019s history, we have\nknown how to anticipate and make the right decision. We\u2019ve come a long way in\nthe past 70 years, but the race towards the car of the future is frenetic,\nwhich is why we are stepping on the accelerator to push innovation in the\ncompany and stay at the front of the pack.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The efforts to capitalize on innovations and the latest advances have also led to a significant growth of the engineering team focused on these new technological products, reaching a record number of more than 1,170 engineers worldwide. Over 700 of them work at the Technological Centre in Viladecavalls (Barcelona, Spain), the group\u2019s most important engineering center, where 160 engineers were hired in 2017 alone.  Over the past five years, Ficosa has bolstered its global presence with new plants in Jandira (Brazil), Shenyang (China), Cookeville (United States) and Rabat (Morocco). The Morocco plant was the latest centre to be inaugurated, last year, and the company\u2019s first foray onto the continent of Africa. Plus, the company has recently reinforced its presence in Portugal with new facilities in Maia. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The history of Ficosa began in 1949 when Josep Pujol Sucarrats supported his son and current president of the company, Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Pujol, in founding a small workshop in Barcelona with Jos\u00e9 Mar\u00eda Tarrag\u00f3, called Pujol y Tarrag\u00f3, which manufactured mechanical cables for the spare parts market.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":34649,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[637],"tags":[6663,628],"class_list":["post-34648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-motoring-2","tag-ficosa","tag-motoring"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34648","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34648"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34648\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.upgrademag.com\/web\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}