List of Strategies & Action plans

This position paper, jointly released by the European Technology Platform ERTRAC and European Partnerships 2Zero and CCAM, urgently calls upon the European Union to strengthen support for the road transport sector’s transformation towards digitalization and decarbonization. The authors emphasize the critical need to defend Europe’s competitiveness against global challenges to its economic sovereignty, particularly within the upcoming EU multi-annual financial framework (FP10).

Road transport is fundamental to European society and economy, enabling daily life, facilitating passenger and freight mobility, and significantly contributing to the EU’s GDP, employment (13 million workers), and trade balance (over €100 billion positive). It is also Europe’s highest R&D spending sector, investing nearly €60 billion annually.

The paper argues that massive investment in Research and Development (R&D) is indispensable for global competitiveness and for achieving key EU objectives, including the Green Deal, Industrial Plan, and Digitalization policy. R&D fosters carbon neutrality, enhances road safety, improves traffic efficiency, and ensures the affordability and resilience of transport systems. Such investment is crucial for reaching the EU’s ambitious 2040 and 2050 targets and securing technological sovereignty.

The European Partnerships 2Zero (Towards Zero Emission Road Transport) and CCAM (Connected, Cooperative and Automated Mobility) are highlighted as effective instruments for addressing decarbonization and automation, respectively. These partnerships have successfully built unique R&I ecosystems, demonstrating efficient, transparent, and multi-stakeholder approaches to defining research agendas and delivering concrete impacts.

To maintain momentum, the paper proposes expanding the scope of both partnerships. 2Zero should evolve to embrace circular economy principles comprehensively, extending its focus beyond vehicle use to include production, end-of-life management, alternative materials, and digital tools for circular processes. CCAM aims to transition from a technology-centric focus to a holistic ecosystem approach, integrating with physical and digital infrastructures, translating technologies into innovative mobility services, and prioritizing digital transformation through software-centric vehicle control, AI integration, and cybersecurity.

The paper also advocates for flexibility and cross-sector collaboration within FP10. It calls for continued horizontal transport calls, allowing for multi-modal and mode-specific research on topics like urban mobility, logistics efficiency, and infrastructure. Furthermore, it stresses the importance of enhanced collaboration with enabling technology sectors (e.g., batteries, hydrogen, chips, data, AI) to maximize innovation potential. Finally, the signatories urge the creation of “European Flagship Projects” with appropriate, ring-fenced budgets in FP10 to demonstrate large-scale innovation impact, identified collaboratively by existing communities and industrial stakeholders. This strategic research support is essential to preserve the automotive and mobility sector’s strength and competitiveness in Europe, delivering critical societal impacts on climate neutrality and road safety.

This report presents a preliminary analysis of the global ecosystem for Connected, Cooperative and Automated Mobility (CCAM), drawing on initial data from the Global CCAM Observatory. It maps 122 automated mobility services and 1,940 component–supplier relationships across 937 companies, providing a structured overview of service deployments, technology stacks, industrial actors, and emerging market trends.

The findings highlight a rapidly expanding yet still transitional sector. Most automated mobility services remain at pilot or early commercial stages, indicating that large-scale deployment has not yet been fully achieved. While activity is growing globally, leadership is concentrated in the United States and China, where commercial operations are more advanced. In Europe, deployments are more fragmented and typically limited to smaller-scale pilots and niche applications.

The industrial ecosystem is characterised by a diverse and fragmented supplier base. Emerging firms dominate the landscape, reflecting the evolving nature of CCAM technologies and the absence of fully consolidated market leaders. The technology stack spans a wide range of components, from sensing and control systems to artificial intelligence and connectivity infrastructure. Notably, many of the most critical and fast-evolving technologies—particularly those related to AI, decision-making, and software integration—are also those where competition remains open and dynamic.

A key insight concerns the structural positioning of the European Union within this global ecosystem. While the EU demonstrates strong capabilities in hardware-intensive domains such as sensors, vehicle systems, and connectivity, it is comparatively underrepresented in software-driven areas, including AI, cloud infrastructure, and automated driving system (ADS) development. This imbalance is significant because value creation and system control are increasingly shifting toward software and data-intensive components.

The report also identifies important trends in industry organisation. Automated driving developers are increasingly adopting vertically integrated models, particularly for core software functions, while relying on external suppliers for hardware components such as sensors and computing platforms. This shift may reduce the influence of traditional suppliers and strengthen the role of system integrators that control overall architecture and data flows.

Market signals indicate strong growth in areas such as AI, sensing (e.g. LiDAR), connectivity (V2X), and cloud-based data infrastructure, underscoring the increasing importance of digital and data-centric capabilities. However, these are also areas where European participation remains relatively limited, creating a potential mismatch between technological opportunity and competitive strength.

Overall, the report concludes that the CCAM ecosystem is at a critical stage of development, with significant opportunities for innovation but also increasing competitive pressure. For Europe, maintaining competitiveness will require strengthening capabilities in software and AI domains, fostering scalable innovation, and addressing dependencies on external suppliers. The findings aim to support evidence-based policymaking and inform strategic actions to enhance Europe’s position in the evolving automated mobility landscape.

These national enforcement guidelines provide guidance about how the requirement of proper control in Australian Road Rule 297 should apply to vehicles with automated functions. The guidelines also confirm that the human driver is responsible for compliance with road traffic laws when a vehicle has conditional automation engaged at a point in time.

Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee, the Committee of the Regions

This Communication outlines the common EU approach and vision towards connected and automated mobility set out in a European agenda including supporting actions to:

• develop and deploy key technologies, services and infrastructure;
• position Europe as a global leader in CCAM across transport modes;
• ensure that EU legal and policy frameworks are ready to support deployment;
• address societal and environmental concerns towards public acceptance

The main recommendation of the Communication revolves around the need to coordinate EU instruments at research and regulatory level, alongside private sector engagements and funding programmes within Member States, to accelerate the transformation towards a safer, more resilient, and efficient transport sector capable of meeting diverse population needs.

A future in which self-driving cars define the traffic landscape: what will this look like and when could we expect this future to arrive, either solely on highways or everywhere? Great uncertainty surrounds these questions. If technological development is rapid, the technology affordable, self-driving cars attractive to car drivers and the societal impacts positive, a ‘self-driving future’ is highly probable. Policy measures moreover can accelerate this transition to a self-driving future. Concurrently, ‘showstoppers’ may emerge: developments that impede the transition.

Aligning policy goals is essential to maximize the societal impact of Connected and Automated Driving (CAD). This involves ensuring sovereignty of local mobility policies, cybersecurity and safety, equitable access to mobility, environmental sustainability, economic efficiency, and social acceptance and inclusion. The discussions focused on collaborative frameworks, large-scale demonstration projects, and the importance of National Access Points (NAPCORE) for data access and exchange.

Key Takeaways:

1. Collaboration: Collaborative frameworks and large-scale demonstration projects are essential to advance AV adoption. Reliable and resilient transportation systems must be supported through partnerships among various stakeholders, including OEMs, logistics companies, infrastructure managers and tech players and should include both rural and urban interests, as well as both passenger and freight transport.
2. Harmonization: National Access Points (NAPCORE) play a critical role in facilitating data access and exchange, requiring EU-wide harmonization and standardization
3. Evaluation: The FAME project supports EU policy making by providing a common evaluation methodology and sharing knowledge and best practices across member states
4. Public/Private Partnerships: Adapting legislation (on national/regional/local level) to support AV deployment, with an emphasis on public/private partnerships, ensuring inclusion and public acceptance, is crucial for success
5. Regulatory Frameworks: Clear regulatory frameworks, mutual recognition of regulations among member states, and addressing biases in algorithms are necessary for effective implementation

The Transport Research and Innovation Monitoring and Information System (TRIMIS) is the analytical support tool for the establishment and implementation of the Strategic Transport Research and Innovation Agenda (STRIA), and is the European Commission’s (EC) instrument for mapping transport technology trends and research and innovation capacities. A total of seven STRIA roadmaps have been developed covering various thematic areas, namely:

— Cooperative, connected and automated transport;

— Transport electrification;

— Vehicle design and manufacturing;

— Low-emission alternative energy for transport;

— Network and traffic management systems;

— Smart mobility and services; and

— Infrastructure.