Three-quarters of the world's top 100 automotive suppliers may not survive the global shift to the electrification of powertrains unless they make plans now, says Paul Eichenberg, an automotive strategy consultant.

"The years between 2020 and 2030 will be the decade of electrification, and if suppliers don't develop an e-mobility strategy and make investments now to operate in that decade, they risk becoming road kill on the global automotive highway," Eichenberg said.

Vehicle electrification is coming faster than many industry analysts expect and is being accelerated by regulations to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, ongoing battery technology and cost breakthroughs, and the diminishing opportunity to economically improve internal combustion engines, he says.

In a white paper, titled: "Electrification Disruption: How not to get shocked, jolted and fried by the coming shift in automotive power sources," Eichenberg says that unless they rethink their approach and secure electronics and software competencies, few traditional auto suppliers will be able to succeed in the electrified auto future.

Electrification technologies, he predicts, will affect almost all vehicles produced by 2030. In looking at the current automotive supply chain, Eichenberg says many traditional auto suppliers are making strategic errors because they:

• Lack an understanding of where the industry is going,
• Are looking at the wrong time horizon and are waiting too long to focus on the coming of electrification,
• Are betting on the past, investing in a dying portfolio of products, rather than the future,
• Have the wrong organizational model with no electronics backbone, scale or platform,
• Employ the wrong staff, with engineering skills sets focused on mechanical and materials rather than on electrical and software, or
• Are seeking safe returns on deployed assets short-term instead of the high reward potential of transitioning to a digital future.

The shift to e-mobility will also jeopardize the long-term future of companies that only supply components for internal combustion engine-driven vehicles.