EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
“THERE IS A CLEAR
NEED, NOT ONLY IN
OUR BUSINESS,
BUT ACROSS THE
AUTOMOTIVE SECTOR,
FOR CLEANER POWER
SOLUTIONS”
Peter Granqvist, chief technology offi cer, Volvo Penta
FINDING HIS FEET
Granqvist is still relatively new to his role as
Volvo Penta’s chief technology offi cer, having
taken up the position in September 2018.
“I’m responsible for research and
development, but also for product strategy
and purchasing and the testing function of the
company. So it’s a pretty wide scope,” says
Granqvist. “In my fi rst year I have spent quite
a lot of time learning about the organization
and the business, and the challenges and
opportunities that we have in front of us. I
spend a lot of time talking to people and
looking at the technical solutions, as well as
our supply base and evolving our strategy
moving forward.
“So I learned a lot when I fi rst joined the
company and now I understand more I’ve
moved more into operations. So, a regular day
for me seems not to exist, no day is the same
as the next! There is a very wide range of
different challenges and opportunities. So it’s
very exciting. I’m extremely pleased to be at
this company right now.”
iVTInternational.com September 2019 15
hybridization and electri cation,
which is very suitable for some
applications. We already have a lot
of projects ongoing for that. Volvo
Penta is looking to have its rst such
solutions commercialized by 2021.
But we also see a big need to
continue to develop combustion
engines, because they will remain in
use for a long time we must make
sure they are as sustainable as they
possibly can be until alternatives are
available. ere are also a lot of
discussions around whether fuel
should be harmonized more – if we
should use more CO2 neutral fuel in
this transition period – until maybe
everything becomes electri ed in
the in the far future. So we are really
in a transition period.”
Engines might not be the rst
part of a vehicle that springs to mind
when thinking of connectivity, but
Granqvist sees lots of opportunities
here, too. “In some markets legal
requirements for connectivity are
being discussed,” he says. “So you
will always know if the engine is
working correctly and e ciently.
ese have not been introduced yet,
but I think it is something that may
happen. Connectivity is a useful
tool, I think, to improve emissions
and to know more about your
machine over its lifetime, and maybe
even to be able to adjust as you go.
So there will be huge opportunities
for even better results.”
e third key area for
development that Granqvist sees is
around automation, beginning today
with partial automation and
advancing to fully automated
vehicles in the future. “ e vehicle
will be able to control itself in
a more e cient way and take care
of certain parameters, for driving
conditions and so on,” he says.
“ e driver will be less and less
in uential on the driving patterns,
which also creates enormous
potential to actually improve
uptime, and reduce emissions. So
a lot of things are happening.”
Indeed, the pace of change can
sometimes feel bewildering, but with
level heads like Granqvist’s leading
the way, there seems good reason to
believe that sustainable industry is
not an unrealistic dream. iVT
Granqvist is looking
forward to an exciting
future for off-highway
/iVTInternational.com
