Current challenges for sustainable product development in the German automotive sector: A survey based status assessment

Since 2015/16, dieselgate has initiated transformations of the automotive industry towards the integration of sustainability into the product development process. The present study combines a qualitative approach, based on semi-structured expert interviews, with a quantitative online survey to identify the current status of this implementation. The objective of the paper is to provide an overview on how German automotive companies currently deal with challenges and chances of a sustainable product development.The study obtained the following core conclusions: (1) A common understanding of the term sustainability is missing and a company-wide definition would be beneficial. (2) There is no consensus on the optimal organizational embedment for sustainability into a company. A centralized responsibility plus distributed awareness was identified as the most promising solution. (3) As a matter of supply and demand, automotive companies will not over-satisfy the customers’ demand. As dieselgate has boosted public interest, possible competitive advantages were identified by transforming the product property “sustainability” to a unique selling point. (4) There is an unmanageable amount of methods for the implementation of sustainability in the product development process. For that reason, academically developed methods are only rarely used in industry. (5) Companies are retrospectively evaluating the results of the development rather than using assessment outcomes systematically to improve the product prospectively. (6) Major potential drivers for sustainable product development are laws & politics, customers and competition.Sustainability could become more attractive for industry and customers by creating win-win-solutions. Conceivable propositions are tax advantages or Pigovian taxes, the internalization of sustainability, the shift from tank-to-wheel- towards holistic well-to-wheel-analyses or product service-systems.