The project enables ZF to reduce conversion costs, improve inventory, performance and quality, and make their workforce more efficient. As all companies are a member of the Open Manufacturing Platform, other customers in the automotive industry will also benefit from ZF’s improvements gained in Diepholz

Transforming manufacturing requires a seamless integration of both information and operations technology. PwC Germany, part of one of the world’s leading professional service firm networks, Microsoft and ZF, as two of the world’s leading technology companies, combine their strengths and experience to translate complex technical information into valuable business insights. The ZF Diepholz plant in northern Germany was selected for a pilot project where ZF and PwC Germany will transform processes and workflows using Microsoft Azure to build the future Digital Manufacturing Platform (DMP) of ZF.

“The world is changing, and so is manufacturing,” says Gabriel González-Alonso, Head of ZF Corporate Production Management. “In these very turbulent times, it was especially important to us that we implement new digital solutions that enable our manufacturing to achieve higher flexibility and efficiency.” This is nothing less than a paradigm shift for ZF. In the past, the software was introduced into each plant one by one and installed on discrete servers. This has evolved into creating a platform in the cloud, connecting ZF’s plants to said platform and rolling out the functionalities to the plant via Microsoft Azure. This horizontal, cross-plant integration with easy scalability makes ZF independent of its local infrastructure.

“To further digitise the ZF Diepholz plant, we will implement a transformation programme with several additional use cases, all of which will be integrated into an end-to-end Smart Factory Transformation for ZF,” explains Michael Bruns, Partner Digital Operations at PwC Germany. Selected cases will aim at creating transparency of production performance from the plant as a whole all the way down to machine level. Others will focus on the traceability of production flows, analysis and prediction of production, and quality outcomes. The third set of used cases aims at enhancing maintenance operations through machine monitoring and fault prediction.

To master these tasks, ZF and PwC Germany will use Microsoft AI to improve planning efficiencies and effectiveness, improve maintenance, repair, and operations (MRO) inventory and present new insights to improve production performance.

Microsoft, which provides the software solutions for PwC Germany’s approach, sees this project as relevant for the digital strategy for all automotive suppliers like ZF. “Our aim is to make this initiative not only a best practice for success at ZF but also an industry-wide inspiration to other automotive customers endeavouring on their own digitalisation projects. We see strong interest across the manufacturing sector globally to leverage digital technologies to drive quality as well as process optimisation, and we’re excited for this project to serve as a true benchmark,” says Marianne Janik, Area Vice President, Microsoft Germany.

The partners will come together to bring fully-networked plants to the next level. Smart factories not only work quickly and reliably, but they also offer a high degree of adaptability for rapid design changes. This leads to more engaged employees, increased business velocity, and stronger growth margins.

Not only will other ZF plants benefit from the insights gained from digitising the Diepholz plant and the capabilities of the DMP, but other organisations may benefit as well. (MT)

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Coretura, a 50:50 joint venture between Daimler Truck and Volvo Group, has entered into an engineering agreement with Accenture to accelerate the development of a software platform for commercial vehicles.

The company, headquartered in Gothenburg, Sweden, currently employs over 100 engineers. It continues to recruit specialists in system architecture, high-performance computing and cloud infrastructure to support its roadmap, which targets the delivery of its first commercialised products towards the end of the decade.

Coretura intends to create a single software platform, language and standard for trucks, buses and other heavy-duty transport vehicles. The platform is designed to support vehicle lifecycles of more than 15 years, moving the industry away from projects that require custom software development for each new vehicle.

As the engineering partner, Accenture will support development across several areas, including:

• Electrical and Electronic (E/E) architecture
• Software abstraction and hardware integration
• Embedded software, middleware, and cybersecurity
• Functional safety and cloud infrastructure

The platform aims to provide a reusable software stack to lower costs and standardise time-to-market for global manufacturers. For fleet operators, the system is designed to allow for continuous software updates and performance upgrades delivered over the air.

Johan Lunden, CEO, Coretura, said, “Our purpose is to advance mobility at the speed of ideas, and that takes depth. Building a full-stack SDV platform demands expertise across embedded software, middleware, cybersecurity, and functional safety, all designed for vehicles with lifecycles measured in decades. Accenture’s reinvention capabilities let us move faster without compromising the standards our customers depend on. This is acceleration, not course correction.”

Rainer Oder, SDV Embedded Software Lead, Accenture, added, “Helping the industry advance software-defined vehicles is a priority for Accenture. Our landmark collaboration with Coretura is designed to change embedded software engineering for automotive platforms. Together, we are looking to solve the challenges of a fully software-defined architecture – addressing critical areas such as hardware abstraction, API management and AI-based engineering optimisations.”

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The ePlane Company has announced the completion of its full-scale electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft, the e200X. Designated PT-01, the prototype has successfully integrated all core subsystems into a single structure, marking the transition from design and simulation to physical testing.

The e200X is designed as a single airframe versatile enough to serve three distinct markets – Passenger Air Taxi, Urban Cargo Carrier and Air Ambulance.

The company emphasises that the aircraft was designed to be compact, allowing it to integrate into existing urban infrastructure without requiring significant city redesigns.

Developed at the company's own facilities in Chennai, the e200X features in-house development of major components, including propellers, airframe structure, landing gear and battery pack.

This vertical integration provides the company with control over performance, manufacturing costs, and iteration speed, having reached this milestone on approximately USD 21 million in funding.

With assembly complete, the e200X will now undergo ground testing, flight testing and certification.

Prof. Satya Chakravarthy, Founder, The ePlane Company, said, "We set out to build an electric aircraft to a world-class benchmark, engineered and manufactured in depth in India for the World.  We deliberately designed the e200X to be compact, because an aircraft that asks a city to rebuild itself around it will not solve the problem it was built to solve. The same airframe can move people as an air taxi, carry goods as a cargo aircraft, and save lives as an air ambulance, and it can do all three using the infrastructure cities already have. That combination of real capability and capital efficiency is how we intend to compete, and win, in markets around the world.”

The company’s board includes prominent figures such as Vishesh Rajaram (Speciale Invest), Eash Sundaram (JetBlue) and Aditya Ghosh (Homage, Akasa Air). The venture, incubated at IIT Madras, has also received international recognition, including being showcased at Bharat Innovates 2026 and featured in Nvidia Founder Jensen Huang’s GTC keynote.

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Chinese technology company Xiaomi has marked a new milestone for its automotive product offering with its electric vehicle.

The company has announced a significant milestone in autonomous vehicle technology by completing the first official autonomous lap of the Nurburgring Nordschleife circuit in Germany with the Xiaomi YU7 GT, equipped with a Track Package, navigating the 20.8 km circuit without a human driver, recording a lap time of 10:29.483.

Following this performance, the Nurburgring has introduced a new official vehicle category: Autonomous Driving (under Electric Vehicles).

The Xiaomi YU7 GT autonomously navigated all 73 corners of the Nordschleife, managing 300 metres of elevation change and varying road surface conditions. The performance was driven by Xiaomi’s autonomous driving system, which integrates the Xiaomi XLA architecture and the MiMo-Embodied foundation model introduced in March 2026. The end-to-end architecture enabled the vehicle to coordinate steering, braking and power delivery in real-time, maintaining stability under high-speed and high-load conditions.

Xiaomi’s autonomous driving programme has evolved since the 2024 launch of Xiaomi HAD. The current system moves beyond simple behaviour imitation toward autonomous decision-making and deeper environmental interpretation. The company stated that the Nurburgring project serves as a critical testing ground to collect data for refining vehicle dynamics modelling, control strategy optimisation and safety redundancy mechanisms.

This achievement underscores Xiaomi’s commitment to advancing artificial intelligence in the automotive sector through rigorous real-world validation.

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QuantumScape Corporation has announced a multi-year joint research agreement with Honda R&D Co., a subsidiary of Honda Motor Co.

The collaboration focuses on advancing QuantumScape’s solid-state lithium-metal battery platform, including the development of associated manufacturing processes.

This agreement follows a successful technology evaluation period during which Honda conducted a technical study and competitive benchmarking of QuantumScape’s battery platform.

Atsushi Ogawa, Chief Operating Officer, Research Center of Excellence, Honda R&D Co, said, “QS technology demonstrated compelling and unique advantages during our evaluation. We see potential for QS technology to add value across a range of applications, including automotive, and we are excited to move forward into the next phase of our partnership.”

Dr. Siva Sivaram, CEO and President, QuantumScape, added, “Honda is a leading global automaker renowned for its engineering excellence and product quality across automotive and other applications worldwide, and its evaluation represents one of the most rigorous assessments of our technology to date. This agreement reflects the growing confidence in QS solid-state lithium-metal batteries to enable safer, higher-density energy storage.”

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