Over 50 international presenters will present their vision for the development of the automotive industry during the Automotive Forum Bulgaria 2024 conference, which started yesterday and will last until June 13, 2024 at the John Atanasoff Innovation Forum, Sofia Tech Park. The event is organized by Automotive Cluster Bulgaria, in partnership with the InvestBulgaria Agency (IBA) and the law firm Kinstellar. This year’s conference will gather over 200 guests, and the program is divided into three thematic days dedicated to the most current technological trends in the sector.
Bulgaria is a preferred country for research and development. We have talented people, very good engineers and trained personnel, Bulgaria is a stable economic country, and GDP growth has been constant over the past 15 years, with the exception of only two. This was said by the Executive Director of the (IBA) Mila Nenova at the opening of the three-day forum. She pointed out that foreign investments are growing, public debt remains low, and business investors are looking for stability of the economy. Foreign companies that have invested in Bulgaria in the last ten years create economic growth and they are ambassadors of Bulgaria, because when a company invests here, it persuades its partners to invest too.
Mrs. Nenova pointed out that at the moment our country is a very good place for investment, and this is also due to our strategic geographical location in times of wars in different parts of the world.
A special participation in the first day of the forum was also taken by Christord Olin and Dr. Shailesh Upreti – representatives of the second largest American manufacturer of lithium-ion batteries C4V and students of Prof. Stanley Whittingham, Nobel Prize laureate in chemistry for the development of lithium-ion batteries. The experience of the UK Battery Industrialisation Centre (UKBIC) in promoting the development of battery technologies and improving the skills of specialists in this field will be shared by Andrew Britten, Business Development Manager at UKBIC.
Innovative practices and projects for the decarbonization of transport will be presented by Callum White, a leading electromobility consultant at the world’s first consulting company specializing in the field of smart cities – Urban Foresight. The main highlights of the forum are the breakthroughs and development of battery technologies, automation in the factory of the future, the transition to electric and autonomous mobility, artificial intelligence for smart mobility, software-defined vehicles.
