GKN Driveline says it continues to see growth among European premium customers, despite conceding the Continent is undergoing increasing turmoil on its southern periphery.
“It is an interesting world at the moment because certainly in Europe, it is two different markets,” GKN Driveline global engineering director, Rob Rickell told just-auto at the Paris motor show.
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“A very successful premium market where we are doing incredibly well with the key German customers and JLR [for example]. Then you have a north-south thing with [others] not doing so well. We are clearly looking at how we can adjust our production – we have some areas where we are working 24/7 and others where we are looking at less than a week – it just depends.
“[Nonetheless] despite continuing global financial turmoil, 2012 is predicted to see an all-time world record in passenger car production, exceeding 60m units. A Paris, we see an impressive array of new cars from the world’s manufacturers, many of which feature our latest driveline technology. The aim for us remains the same – to deliver more power dynamically using less mass and less drag.”
The GKN global engineering chief added the company was firmly focused on achieving that ‘dynamic power’ by improving efficiency and achieving savings through weight reduction.
“In almost every one of our components, they become more efficient,” said Rickell. “If we can improve the efficiency by 1%, it makes improvements on miles per gallon and emissions. Absolutely key in all this is very low friction bearings for drivetrains.”
At the Mondial de l’Automobile in Paris this week, GKN featured its products on Mitsubishi’s new Outlander plug-in hybrid for example such as the eTransmission and rear sideshafts. The AWD version specification includes a Power Transfer Unit (PTU) and an electro-magnetic control device to improve performance.
The show is also featuring the Range Rover Evoque with front and rear sideshafts, a PTU and a Rear Differential Module, as well as an electronic torque manager.
Front and rear propshafts are also sourced from GKN Driveline.
