Um, Mr. Managing Director, Madam Director, my dear colleagues, before starting this hearing we need to proceed with two appointments of rapporteurs, first for the examination in committee on November 20 of the proposed law aimed at freezing energy prices in mainland France and overseas territories, which will be examined in public session on Thursday, November 28 as part of the day reserved for the LFI-NFP group. I have received from this group the candidacy of Mrs. Alma du Four for the role of rapporteur. If there is no opposition, it is thus decided. Furthermore, for the examination of the proposed law aimed at extending the exemption for the use of meal vouchers for any food product, number 532, filed at the end of last week by our colleagues Anne Lorblin and Jean-Pierre Tête, and which we will be required to examine next Wednesday, I have received from the Republican Right group the candidacy for the role of rapporteur of Mrs. Anne Lorblin. If there is general agreement, it is thus decided. And we now move to the hearing.
So the Economic Affairs Committee has heard, as you know, over the past two months the CEOs of the Michelin group, Sanofi France, and continues this morning with these hearings which focus on essential companies of our industry. And so I have the pleasure of receiving in this context the senior representatives of the Stellantis group. I am happy, we are happy to welcome Mr. Jean-Philippe Imparato, who is director of the Europe region — sorry, general director of the enlarged Europe region of the Stellantis group, accompanied by Mrs. Marion Beret, director of communications and public affairs France of this group, whom we also greet. So I think I can say on behalf of — that we would also have been delighted to welcome Mr. Carlos Tavares, who cannot participate personally in this hearing. But know that it is extremely important for us to have leaders of groups and large companies, especially since obviously all these large companies benefit in one form or another from public power, and therefore our national representation obviously insists that leaders be heard. I continue my opening remarks, and obviously we will then move to the interventions of each parliamentary group. We wish to discuss with you your choices, the prospects of your group in France, more broadly the very important challenges facing the automotive industry within the framework, as we all know, of particularly intense international competition, often unfair, moreover. The Stellantis group has become a major multinational globally; it has experienced in recent months a decline in turnover in Europe, even more so in North America, and that naturally causes a lot of concern. So this morning we invite you to explain the industrial strategy of your group, and notably with expected sales and an operating margin between 5.5% and 7%, and we wonder if this is not potentially at the expense of employment. I have, like others, visited the employees of the Ma France plant in Hain-sous-Bois, on the edge of my constituency; obviously we wonder, in a context of a layoff plan announced by Stellantis or a number of its subcontractors, about the conditions of these workers in terms of bonuses and professional retraining. That will certainly be one of my first questions in this context: how will Stellantis support all its employees? We also know that competition is tough globally, especially in the electric vehicle sector, and facing imports from Asia and China. What do you recommend in terms of public policies? Can we continue with a protection at European borders that is much weaker, for example, than that of the United States? Obviously, the election results in the US will also have repercussions in this matter, as you know. More generally, how can public power act to protect and develop automotive production in the European Union in the face of this competition from Asia, which is likely to increase? What are your company's prospects? Stellantis has chosen to relocate components of its value chain; I think, for example, of the Rennes plant which produced machine tools. Were there no other possible choices? Your partnership with Leapmotor with a Chinese startup, for example, does it not carry the risk of loss of technological sovereignty or opening even more space to Chinese competition? Another problem: France's access to rare materials, such as lithium, necessary for the production of batteries and electric vehicles. What can we do to strengthen our industrial sovereignty in this area? What is the contribution of companies to this effort? Furthermore, Stellantis, as you know, has recently insisted that the decarbonization requirements of the French sector be maintained. However, the government has decided to ask the European Commission not to apply the planned sanctions against car manufacturers who would not have met, as of 2025, their CO2 emission reduction targets. What does this imply for the Stellantis group, given the efforts the group claims to have made to reduce emissions of the vehicles it produces? This leads me to a central question that I think many of us are asking: what will be the impact of the transition from combustion engine vehicles to electric vehicles on employment? Stellantis, as we said, plans to eliminate several hundred jobs, for example at Metz-Borny, Trémery, in the name of the transition to electric. Other sites are threatened; I think of Douvrin in the North. Were there no other possible choices to preserve employment, knowing that there were exceptional margins and profits at Stellantis in 2022 and 2023? And I also said earlier: what measures do you plan to compensate and retrain these employees? More broadly, what are your responsibilities both as a direct producer and as a contractor towards your subcontractors? And we see that a number of equipment suppliers are in great difficulty; I also cited the case of Ma France in Saint-Denis. So I thank you, Mr. Managing Director, and Madam Director, for being with us to inform the members of our committee and answer their questions. I think it is very important for us, as I said earlier and as we discussed privately. I now give you the floor for about fifteen minutes, after which we will hear the spokespersons of the groups, each for 3 minutes maximum if possible. And in any case, we will give you the floor as much as possible each time, and at the end of these interventions as well. Then we will move to questions: one minute of questions per deputy who wishes, then one minute of response from you. Thank you again for accepting this invitation, Mr. Managing Director and Madam Director.
Good morning Madam President, Madam and Mr. Vice-Presidents, ladies and gentlemen deputies, thank you for your welcome. Beyond the pleasure of answering your questions, I would like to discuss with you what is on the horizon for our industry. Not just for Stellantis, but I think that in less than 9 weeks now we will experience a change that is not a change of degree but a change of grade in our industry, probably never seen in the last 50 years. So I think this is the moment we can have this kind of exchange, we industrialists and you legislators in this context. In preparing this meeting, I asked myself what should I tell you in my opening remarks? Let's try to be both very transparent and very up to date. Jean-Philippe Imparato, I am 58 years old, born in 1967 in the south of France. I have spent my entire career in the group, first at PSA, at Automobiles Peugeot from the end of the 1990s, first in Burgundy, then in the Lyon region, and finally in Toulouse before taking on a number of responsibilities that led me to become CEO of Automobiles Peugeot in 2007-2016, then President of Alfa Romeo in 2021, head of the group's global commercial vehicles, and for the past few weeks, head of Europe. So I am arriving in Europe; I know this business a bit for having practiced it and for having taught the basics of this trade in your constituencies, I would even say in your villages, because I have been in contact since the beginning of my career with dealers and agents who number 4,000 in France and represent about 50,000 people who work, once again, in my view, in villages for 30 years. So we are on the eve of a major change, and I thought I would give you a quick portrait of Stellantis and France, France and Stellantis: where we stand, what we do, and how we prepare for what lies ahead. What lies ahead? First, it is not a surprise. We knew it at the opening of the Paris Motor Show in 2018. I remember, I was launching the 508 in France, produced in Mulhouse, and we said 'let's go with the 508 in France' and we received on the press days of the Paris Motor Show 2018 the two major thresholds of the evolution towards energy transition of the European Union: 2021 we pass to a certain percentage of electric in our total sales, 2025 we make a jump, I will come back to that, 2035 we are at zero emissions overall. That is the framework set in 2018, and so no one can say today that they are surprised by this framework. Moreover, we have adopted that Stellantis in 2038 will be zero emissions across the entire value chain: suppliers, manufacturing, products, and distribution network. 2038 is tomorrow, with a milestone of -30% in 2030 compared to all 2021 emissions, which means 65% of our electric vehicles by 2030, 65% two-thirds, and obviously a milestone in 2025: on January 1, 2025, for every 100 cars sold in Europe — this is a regulation we must obviously reach — we will have to sell 21% electric vehicles. Order of magnitude: this morning we are at 12%, and at 12% we are leader in France with 27% penetration, and at 12% I believe we are leader in Europe in commercial vehicles with 38% market share. This means a jump from 1 to 2 in 9 weeks, and if nothing changes in terms of market, i.e., in terms of acceptability by the final customer, this market is moving. This will inevitably produce a certain number of decisions to be taken to adapt to the market conditions that will be those of 2025. In other words, my message is: we are ready, and I will show you. We need an alliance between industrialists on one side, distributors on the other, and public power to accompany us in this transition. Why don't we want to move on this transition? Because we think there is only one way to solve the issue of emissions from individual mobility: it is electric. Any other alternative in a visible horizon is not viable, and if we want to take this subject seriously, we must do it together.
So that's the first point. Stellantis and France, Stellantis in France today: what is it? First, France is a pillar, one of the three global pillars of Stellantis: France, Italy, United States. It is one of the three subjects we have to deal with and protect. It is 42,000 employees out of 240,000, including 6,000 engineers in research and development. That is France for Stellantis. It is also 12 plants, within these 12 plants assembly units where we make cars. Obviously you know them, you all know them: Poissy, Rennes, Sochaux, Mulhouse, Douvrin, Valencienne. We produce 12 electric vehicles on platforms that are multi-energy platforms, meaning they can host either 100% electric, hybrid, plug-in hybrid, or potentially traditional combustion engine vehicles, which will be subject to regulations at the beginning of next January. So to protect our industrial fabric in this period of rapid hyper-transition, we thought the best way to protect them is to make available to these plants platforms that allow them to change energy according to regional and/or local regulations that we will have to face. So that is secure. And to answer part of your question earlier, when you say 'what is the future?' We will share how we do it every year in mid-November with the union organizations, what we call our medium-term plan, a 3-year plan because we have little visibility on what will happen. But what I can tell you at this stage is that we have no particular announcement planned for the 3-year plan, which should secure because on the five assembly plants we have a precise industrial plan, and therefore over the next three years we have no particular announcements at this stage to make on the future of this or that plant. The rest we will share with the union organizations because we obviously do not want to put our industrial strategy on the public record. But not only that: in France you have five assembly plants that make cars, but you have more than that in France. You have seven organ and component plants that are engaged in an electric future. And the best way to protect them or limit the impact on these plants of the transition ahead, once again, we have allocated to each of these plants essential components to maintain their activity. To put it simply: Trémery, with an investment of 288 million, will make electric motors. Metz, which until now was dedicated to manual gearboxes and typically was a plant that could not envision a future beyond 2030, will make e-DCT gearboxes, i.e., the gearboxes that go with electric motors. Charleville, what did it do? It made cylinder heads for combustion engines; tomorrow it will manufacture electric motor casings. Valencienne was traditionally associated with the production of manual and automatic gearboxes; Valencienne will manufacture reducers for electric motors and will assemble electric machines whose motors, moreover, come from Trémery. Fond, a manufacturer of combustion engines, will now make braking systems. Whether electric or combustion, you have to brake, so the best way to protect Fond is to have it make braking systems. Mulhouse will assemble the rear axles of electric and hybrid versions. Allow me this detail because it is important. And finally, Douvrin will be inscribed in a dynamic of energy transition alongside ACC, the battery manufacturing plant next door. So we have a territorial mesh between the five assembly plants and the seven component plants we have, preparing with an investment of 3 billion euros over the last 5 years for this energy transition, whose main effects we will see in January. That's for the industries. Don't forget one thing: once again, in each of your towns, villages, and constituencies, you have dealers and agents who employ people. We have 4,000 of them in France for Stellantis; multiply by two for our competitors and for the other non-French brands. We have an order of magnitude of 12,000 to 15,000 garages in your areas. They are all involved in this energy transition. They will all have to live through this movement. It's true for salespeople but not only; it's true for after-sales. Today, if you are an apprentice in a garage, it's better to learn electrothermics than mechanics, and we will change oil filters less often. So we have to move. And so the movement is an overall movement that involves the entire supply chain, the suppliers we will accompany in this transition, but also the distributors and their employees.
What happens in January is of an epochal order, I would say. We must go from an electric mix of about 12% to about 21%, that is 9 additional points of mix out of 100 sales. I give you an order of magnitude: one point of mix not achieved costs 300 million euros in fines at the European Community level. One point of mix: 300 million. We will not pay; we will organize to be able to meet this mix. I conclude: we are ready to approach this energy transition because our industrial system is ready. We have 12 electric vehicles that will be put on the market, a number of them below the fateful bar of 20,000 euros to have maximum accessibility on the French market. We think it is important that public power mobilizes with us to work on how to motivate customers to embark on this electric transition, how to protect the networks, particularly regarding used vehicles so that they are protected in this electric transition, and how in general we push something that is obvious in most of your constituencies: the charging network. If we want to go electric, you have to charge, and that's a problem we have addressed together, Madam President. Thank you.
Thank you very much. I suggest we now move to the spokespersons of the groups. So for the National Rally, Mrs. Géraldine Grangier. Thank you.
Thank you, Madam President. My dear colleagues, Mr. Managing Director, thank you for your presence. The merger between PSA and Fiat Chrysler had raised great expectations, promising synergies valued at 5 billion euros per year. However, internal tensions linked to cultural differences and the geographical diversification of the group are weakening the sustainability of our national plants. The future of Stellantis's French sites, particularly Sochaux, which is in my constituency, Rennes, and others, is causing growing concern. Sochaux is the historic birthplace of Peugeot, with 44,000 employees in 1974; today there are only 6,000, mostly temporary workers. Sochaux, having become a star among stars, embodies much more than a production center. Sochaux represents recognized know-how in the automotive field, thousands of jobs for a territory, and an essential contribution to French industrial dynamism. Sites like Sochaux, Rennes, and elsewhere benefit from a strong regional anchoring and deserve to be considered as assets for the future of Stellantis in Europe. The recent announcement of the Stellantis Sochaux plant, which plans to assemble 200 additional vehicles per day, testifies to a desire to strengthen production capacity in France. Although this initiative may contribute to increasing the competitiveness of the Sochaux site, it is not enough to dispel fears about the sustainability of jobs and the long-term vision for all French sites of the group. Indeed, while 250 job cuts have been announced at the Rennes plant and we are talking about the sale of the La Ferté-Vidame testing center, a historic site of Citroën heritage, it is legitimate to question the group's strategic vision for guaranteeing a future for these historic French sites. The potential impact on local subcontracting companies, whether SMEs in Franche-Comté or elsewhere, is considerable. It risks destabilizing already fragile industrial ecosystems and causing massive job losses. Faced with fierce global competition and while the group has benefited from substantial public support for years, it is important that Stellantis demonstrates its willingness to preserve the French automotive industry and its jobs in order to maintain the economic and social balance of the territories where it is established. Mr. Managing Director, you recently highlighted Stellantis's ambition to become a high-performing and sustainable group with the territorial mesh you mentioned. This ambition must be accompanied by a commitment to the territories that contributed to your growth. Carlos Tavares, whom I met a month ago, took a forced turn, the forced turn of the electric vehicle. Will he take the turn of the hydrogen sector? Do you plan to integrate this technology to ensure a stable future for your French sites? And finally, how do you intend to implement a clear and ambitious strategy in our regions to sustainably strengthen the historic sites and, above all, their subcontractors? Thank you for your answers.
I have how many minutes? 30 seconds? A small minute. I think we will see the deputies. I think I have one minute for you to respond.
So I share your concern. As CEO of Peugeot in 2016, I launched the 3008 at Sochaux, so I can tell you I have a particular sensitivity to the region and the plant. I was there last week. Extraordinary things have happened at Sochaux in recent years. They are on a completely consistent line with the assembly plan we have, and we launched the e-3008 and e-5008 last month with a positive cadence evolution because, in addition, I have the orders. So what is happening is that Sochaux is working 7/7 at the moment, 7/7, and we will call for volunteers for the Christmas week. So I think I can say that Sochaux, in terms of future on this segment which, as you know, is essential for Peugeot, is both protected and framed. Rennes is in the process of moving to another generation of C5 Aircross for Citroën, which is maintained at Rennes. So necessarily I have adjustments depending on the age of the cars and their renewal cadence, but there is no concern for either of the two sites in a visible horizon, which is our usual 3-year plan. Obviously, what I ask them is to be competitive, so to move, and they are moving because Sochaux made a revolution that is just extraordinary. So I can tell you that these two sites are today fully in the race for the best electric range, pardon, the best autonomy on the market with 700 km. Hydrogen? Yes, for commercial vehicles. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Managing Director. I forgot to specify that this morning at the bureau we decided — but I will not apply it rigorously this morning because it was decided but it's a bit complicated to apply now given that it was planned differently by the speakers — we decided that from now on, within the speaking time of 4 minutes total, we would cap the speaker's intervention at 3 minutes. However, since it has just been decided, I propose not to apply it rigorously today and therefore to leave a little leeway, including when we exceed 3 minutes. Is that clear? So, for the next hearing, I will obviously enforce it. Alright. Now, for the PR group, Jean-Luc Fugit.
Thank you, Madam President. Mr. Managing Director, Madam Director, on behalf of our group, I wish to thank you for your presence and your insights. Our group is convinced that the automotive industry is at the heart of the challenges of reindustrialization, decarbonization, improvement of air quality in urban areas, but also of the daily mobility challenges of the French. It is a major French asset in our common fight against fossil fuels. Five years ago, we voted the Mobility Orientation Law with the flagship measure notably of ending the sale of vehicles using fossil fuels by 2040. Since then, with the Climate and Resilience Law voted in 2021, we have supported numerous support mechanisms for French mobility, such as social leasing, retrofit aid for vehicles, and progressive objectives for greening vehicle fleets. These measures must now be maintained and amplified, especially social leasing, which we are advocating with our group in the context of the finance bill currently under discussion. We particularly wish to increase the bonus aid for electric vehicles so that our automotive industry can face the competition and industrial protectionism of the United States and China. This is all the more important because yesterday, during questions to the government, the Minister of Industry, Marc Ferracci, reminded us that the situation of the automotive industry is worrying. The measures we propose have an ambition: to protect our automotive industry and build the decarbonized mobility of tomorrow. So, in your opinion, are they sufficient to ensure the sustainability of our automotive industry? I also wish to come back to the question of the future of professions in the automotive sector. As technologies evolve, the automotive industry is transforming radically, calling for new skills. So how do you anticipate this evolution of automotive professions, and how do you support the mobilization of these new skills for employees? Finally, in your industrial strategy, you wish to produce more affordable vehicles to accelerate the ecological transition. The problem is that many vehicles are mostly produced in China with assembly in low-cost countries in Europe. It seems to us that this strategy could lead to unprecedented layoffs and a pauperization of French industrial zones. Why not, as Toyota seems to manage, become competitive by working more with French and European subcontractors rather than with Chinese subcontractors? Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Fugit. Mr. Managing Director.
Well, first of all, Mr. Deputy, thank you for this point on social leasing. I think it is absolutely essential to support demand, because at the end of the day, the entire electric transition is about selling cars to customers who can buy them. It is absolutely essential that purchase aid mechanisms be maintained in 2025 for new electric vehicles, but also for used vehicles. Think of the networks that have used vehicles on their lots. Passenger cars, commercial vehicles. Let's think of artisans who will have to travel in city centers with zero emissions tomorrow and who do not all have the possibility to buy electric vehicles easily. In other words, it is important that massive support accompanies this electric transition. So I am perfectly aligned with what you are saying. Second, do we produce electric vehicles in France? Yes, 12. I have the list. So we are ready. Are we going to produce vehicles of Chinese origin? Are we going to import them into France? We have an agreement with Leapmotor, of which we have bought 21%. I remind you that I have 68 dealers in France waiting to know if Leapmotor will benefit from the bonus as of January 1, 2025. These people have employees, they are ready to sell cars. 12 vehicles produced in France right now, electric, including a number of launches arriving, including the 3008, 5008, and other vehicles ready to be on the market. I think the time is up. Yes, I believe there is still the question of subcontractors, but I propose perhaps to answer it at the end since you will also have speaking time, if that works for you, on training and at the end of the group spokespersons' interventions.
If that works for you. So now for the La France Insoumise group, Laurent Alexandre.
Thank you, President. Madam Director, Mr. Managing Director, the French automotive industry has lost 110,000 jobs in 20 years. This is a consequence of the relocations decided by manufacturers to countries with lower labor costs. Know that the deputies of the New Popular Front do not share this choice, which implies loss of industrial sovereignty and human, economic, and social damage. 70,000 jobs are threatened among the suppliers of French car manufacturers. Michelin has just announced the closure of the Cholet and Vannes plants, i.e., 1,290 jobs in my department of Loire-Atlantique. I saw SAM be relocated with the shameful approval of Mr. Macron's government; it was one of the last foundries in France, a highly strategic activity for the automotive industry. The site of Bourbon-l'Archambault, which produced injectors and spark plugs, went from 1,800 to 500 employees today. Stellantis is responsible for numerous social plans directly or as a contractor: Novares Strasbourg -126 jobs, Forvia in Villers-la-Montagne -66 jobs, Ma France in Hain-sous-Bois -280 jobs, Stellantis Mulhouse -600 jobs, Stellantis Poissy -250 jobs. Yet France comes to the rescue of its automotive industry; it was the case when the state became a shareholder of PSA, and it is still the case with the support plans for the automotive industry and all the public aid paid today by the nation to Stellantis. Can you tell us the amount of French public aid received by Stellantis? It certainly exceeds one billion euros in recent years. Can you then confirm the following figures: Stellantis earned 18.6 billion euros in profit in 2023, Stellantis distributed 4.7 billion euros in dividends to its shareholders in 2024, Stellantis pays its CEO 36 million per year, i.e., 100,000 euros per day. I remind you of your responsibilities towards France. It is an economic, political, and moral question. You cannot pocket public aid and use your profits to relocate factories and overpay your shareholders and executives. Stop, enough is enough. You want public aid, then accept to produce and maintain jobs and skills in France. The government also has a responsibility to protect and relocate our industrial productions through solidarity protectionism. That is the subject of the New Popular Front's proposals. I come to the subject of electric vehicles. Can you confirm that Stellantis is planning in France only intermediate-sized cars and SUVs with high added value? The C3 Aircross will be produced in Slovakia, the e-C3 in Slovenia. Can you confirm that the e-208 will not be produced in France either? No small electric vehicle will be produced in France by Stellantis. We cannot accept that. Choosing heavy and expensive models is accepting a two-speed France, with a majority of the population unable to buy cars. Building affordable vehicles in France is entirely possible. Can you answer this demand? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Deputy, for your question. You cited two cases. Wait, excuse me. Mr. Deputy, thank you for your question. You cited two cases that concern exactly subjects on which we are in absolute protection of our plants and also of our suppliers. You cited the case of injectors, I imagine for diesel engines, and you cited the case of a foundry for which, for example, we completely restructured this foundry to give them braking systems. So yes, we are at the heart of the transformation. To try to synthesize: yes, we have received aid, obviously. We have reinvested it in France: 3 billion euros in the energy transformation over the last 5 years, securing five assembly plants and seven component plants. That is our response to the question. Do I produce in France? Yes, and we produce in France a certain number of vehicles. I will give you the list and you will judge for yourself whether it answers the question asked. We make DS3 and Opel Mokka at Poissy. We make 3008 and 5008 at Sochaux. Peugeot 308 and 308SW at Mulhouse — that is not an extremely expensive vehicle either. We make 408 and an SUV for Citroën. And above all, we make commercial vehicles at Hordain to serve businesses. So I think our effort is commensurate with the question and commensurate with the demand. But very sincerely, we will all probably have to do more to achieve an energy transition with the least possible impact on the entire industrial fabric. Thank you.
Thank you. So for the Socialist group, Mrs. Valérie Rossi.
Madam President, Mr. Managing Director, Madam Director, and dear colleagues, thank you for playing along with our question-and-answer game. Stellantis is the fourth largest car manufacturer in the world, a group resulting from the merger of the French group PSA and the Italian-American group Fiat Chrysler Automobiles. This group is an industrial jewel, particularly in France, but it could have disappeared 10 years ago. A socialist government saved PSA from bankruptcy by having the state intervene in the capital of a company that could not recover from the 2008 financial crisis. Reading the 2023 financial report of your company, we find surprising passages about the Dutch strategy of the group and its relationship with the country that ensured its survival. I will read you a translated excerpt from English: 'We operate so as to be treated exclusively as a Netherlands resident company for tax reasons. If we were to fail to maintain a presence in France, the tax losses carried forward up to 50% of taxable income in France would be lost. This risk will decrease over time.' As of December 31, 2023, you still have 1.76 billion euros in tax loss carryforwards out of the 9 billion euros reportable after the 2020 financial year. Given what appears in this financial report, I have a first question: what will be the relationship of your group to France when, to use your words, these carryforward losses have been fully used? This concern is all the stronger because the industrial strategy of your group seems to be moving away from the research and production of made-in-France vehicles, for which you have benefited from significant tax credits and public subsidies, towards a role of distributor of Chinese electric vehicles. Speaking of research, here is my second question: Stellantis files about 1,000 patents per year. Would the reduction of the research tax credit planned in the 2025 finance bill have a negative impact on your innovations? Finally, third and last question: social plans are piling up in France currently: Michelin, Auchan. Will Stellantis be one of the next names on the list? How can you reassure employees who are looking at their company with concern? What are the guarantees on employment and production? I am an elected official from a department on the border on the other side of the Alps. Italian unions are asking the same questions. Thank you.
I live in Italy. I have lived in Italy since January 15, the date of Stellantis's creation, because I could not manage Alfa Romeo from Paris, you can imagine. So I went to Italy. And apart from what you said, Madam Deputy, about the tax establishment of Stellantis in the Netherlands, there is an extremely important point: this baby Stellantis is the addition of 71 nationalities, but it is also the addition of three large countries: the United States, France, Italy, and I would say Germany. And we needed to install Stellantis in a place where we could not be suspected of favoring one or the other, aside from tax questions. So I can tell you that this baby, Stellantis, was installed in a place that allows us to say that all the children of Stellantis, if I may say so, this baby of 3 or 4 years old now, is not treated in a way that could be suspicious towards others. First point. Second point concerns our long-term investment. I think I have answered that question: it will be stable and constant. We will be at the end of 2024 with a production capacity in France of 1 million cars. It will be maintained for the 3-year horizon that I mentioned and that we will share with the unions in a few days. The assembly plan of Stellantis for these terminal plants in France is not called into question, and the fact that we are moving to electric allows us to say that we will be able to protect them from temperature and pressure variations on the market. So we will protect the French industrial fabric. Thank you, Mr. Managing Director.
Thank you, Mr. Managing Director. For the Republican Right group, Julien Dive.
Thank you, Madam President. Mr. Managing Director, you said earlier: Stellantis is France, the automotive industry is France, the whole industry is France, because industry is what is implanted in our territories, creates wealth, creates value. The mirage of a service society is in reality a society of servitude. And I really believe that being able to support industry and put the means for this industry to persist is a challenge we must apply ourselves to, and even more so in the automotive industry. Except that the automotive industry in France represents 200,000 jobs, and each year about 8,000 disappear. We see the trend, whatever the domain. The example of Michelin yesterday will go high this summer. Even the Stellantis group, with the gearbox plants or the Rennes site with jobs, certainly short-term contracts, you will tell me they are short contracts, temp contracts not renewed, but nonetheless, these are jobs disappearing in the automotive industry. And I have the feeling that we had a real hope in 2022-2023 with beautiful announcements. I take the example of ACC gigafactory installed in the Hauts-de-France, my region. I would not want, and you will confirm or deny, that today is the time of disillusionment, and the example of ACC is quite striking. You are a holder of one-third of ACC's shares, this gigafactory, and you had announced three sites in Hauts-de-France at Douvrin, next to the Française de Mécanique, a historic site for combustion engines, a site in Kaiserslautern in Germany, and a site in Italy. And it seems that the two Italian and German sites are now halted, and the French site of Douvrin, which is built and operational, is not necessarily operating at full capacity of expected results. I saw an article yesterday explaining that developed cells had been thrown away because they did not meet industrial needs. So the question I wanted to ask you: what is the technological choice you are making today on batteries, and are you committed to conducting partnerships, including with renowned specialized European players on the battery issue? How do you plan to support the employees of the Douvrin site, the historic Française de Mécanique, in this transition, who are experienced and have recognized expertise on combustion engines? And finally, do you consider that the choice of public authorities at the European level on electric or all-electric is really the choice that had to be made, and that ultimately maintains this deindustrialization of the automotive industry? Thank you, Mr. Managing Director.
Should we have made this choice? It is a bit late to answer. It is done. Should we have asked the question earlier? I would say so. But we say: whatever the choice, the only way to solve the CO2 emissions question of individual mobility is electric. So we have to go for it, otherwise we will find ourselves with fines every day. So we have to go for it, in order. So what we have done is to empower: we have invested in about 40 electrified vehicles worldwide, and we said to ourselves...
We would not be dependent on China for battery supply, because that would be the best way to see battery prices increase by 50% overnight. That's the only way. And as you already know, electric is 40% more than thermal. At some point we said we make the cars and we make the batteries. Simply, the development, the pace, the ramp-up of ACC for example will be strictly linked to the market, which is the subject of my intervention today. If we want to go seriously, we have to go massively together. Let's pull demand through adapted public policies. We take care of the entire production, including the price of AC. Moreover, ACC is a good reservoir of skills available for Douvrin right next door. So if ACC ramps up, the Douvrin question will be naturally resolved by ACC's attractiveness. We have temporized on the rest, yes, because we are waiting to see what the electric market will be in 2025. For now, this market is on the order of 12%. It must be multiplied by 2 in 9 weeks. We will see how it goes.
Thank you very much. We now move to the group for the Ecologist and Social group, Charles Fournier.
Thank you, thank you for taking part in this hearing. On July 25, Carlos Tavares said that Stellantis's margin was the strongest among car manufacturers. He even said that since its creation, this group was obviously one of the most profitable and that you were psychopaths of performance, to use his expression. But just a few months later, we learn that your sales fell 27% in the third quarter of 2024, and if we talk about October, it's more than 20%, while the overall market is down 11%, if my figures are correct. How did you get there? Certainly there is the transition to electric cars, which your group has accelerated phenomenally, and you are almost the only ones within European targets. But this decline is also the result of a policy that has reached its limits: an aggressive supply policy with ever-increasing margins. Since his arrival, Carlos Tavares has chosen to increase the price of Stellantis vehicles to favor value over volume, again using his own expressions. In 2024, the Peugeot 108, for example, increased by 200 euros. Between the continuous decline in purchasing power and the increase in car prices, the car is soon becoming a luxury good. Cars too expensive for consumers, but economical for you since they cost you half as much to produce as your competitors, and you spend half as much on R&D as your competitors as well. The only place where you don't make savings is on the remuneration of your shareholders, with more than 7 billion in dividends and share buybacks planned for 2024. As a result of the drop in your sales, your group has suspended production in its North American and Italian plants. I'll skip the list that is underway. And what will happen for France? You tell us for three years nothing will change, perhaps for your own production, but all your subcontractors. I had said we would get to the subcontractors. For you, subcontractors, what will be their future? I am from a region where we experienced over several years an absolutely dramatic social plan on the subcontractor side. I'm thinking of Imperial Wheels, Châtellerault. You were one of the order givers. Sometimes the subcontractors execute, but sometimes they are also executed economically. That is the case of Poolflex in Saint-Martin-le-Beau. We could cite many who unfortunately are the adjustment variables of your strategies. So my question is simple: what future for your employees? What future for your subcontractors? How will you support these subcontractors? You have barely mentioned them in your remarks so far. And finally, will you change your strategies? Is the transition to electric cars the only explanation for the situation you are in? Thank you very much, Mr. Director General.
I go every month to the plant, currently to the former Fiat Romeo plant in Cassino and Pomigliano, to work with my teams on reducing total production cost, that is, the manufacturing cost of our cars. And I do this in partnership with our suppliers. So one of the first answers to your question is the following: every time we carry out an operation aimed at reducing the manufacturing cost of a car, whatever it is, whatever the plant, we do it and we transfer the ideas to our supplier ecosystem systematically. What Carlos also said, aside from 'psychopath of performance,' was that there was no demand made to suppliers that we had not first tested ourselves inside our plants, assessing feasibility. That is absolutely certain. So afterwards, some follow with us who can do it, and others who can do it less, and there you have restructuring, that is absolutely obvious. I cannot tell you that nothing will happen in the supplier fabric if we do not have a common drive to achieve it. It is already happening and will continue. My mission is to support them as best as possible through the transformation. They must go with us anyway. In the end, the final judge will be the customer; he will buy or not the cars that are offered in front of us. So that's for the supplier part. They are supported. We have approaches equivalent to what we do in cost reduction. And I think there is no fatality at all. We can very well produce in France; we demonstrate it ourselves, by the way, with the assembly plants that are running in these countries. And there is no question of changing strategy on that. We will continue to support them. They are with us. There are massive restructuring efforts that must be made in this ecosystem. We will try to limit the impacts. Thank you.
I have substantially exceeded the time, but obviously you will have another speaking time after the CEOs, and I also specify that group speakers can ask another question after these interventions. So we now move to the Democratic group with Ms. Louise Morel.
Thank you, Madam President, Mr. Director General, Madam Director of Public Affairs, dear colleagues. On behalf of the Democratic group, we also thank you for your presentation and the information you shared on the trajectory of your group and the concrete challenges. We naturally share your vision that we need a real partnership in the face of all these challenges between public authorities and private actors. Many questions have been asked. I will come back to two of them quickly to leave you time to answer. You have begun to address the financial situation of your group; you understand that it concerns several political groups on these benches. On our side, we salute it: you announced 30 billion euros in investment over 5 years to become the leader in the low-emission vehicle market. In a fairly short-term perspective, 5 years is tomorrow. How do you plan, given this overall market situation, to meet these commitments in terms of investment in electric vehicles? And the second thing: in your introduction, you mentioned a number of hesitations that still accompany customers regarding electric vehicles. Naturally, there is the price issue, and also for people living in rural or mountainous areas, as in my case, the issue of vehicle range. How do you see the answers we could collectively provide to this subject? Thank you, Mr. Director General.
Pardon, Madam Deputy, thank you. Regarding a strategic orientation, I confirm the orders of magnitude you cited in terms of investment, which are all planned in our group. Whatever the cyclical variations in results, they are assured. We cannot both say we are carbon neutral in 2038 and not give ourselves the means. The transition is not simply linked to products; we also have the entire industrial ecosystem that will be zero emission. For example, all plants are equipping themselves with their own capacity to have zero energy by 2030. Last week we realized we consume 5 cubic meters of water to produce a car; we will divide that by two. So there is a part of heavy investment we are making, and a part of investment, I would say, more of adjustment of our processes that is being done. So I confirm these envelopes. On the other hand, you touch the heart of the electric transformation. In general, we say that a customer who has tried electric does not go back. The problem is convincing them to take the plunge. And one of the key points, if I had to tell you what is on our shopping list to solve the issue, France is probably the best prepared on this matter, concerns the charging network. The charging network in urban areas is one thing, but the charging network in the provinces and rural areas is another. So if there is one effort we should work on together, it is indeed the development of charging networks. Range will no longer really be a problem, first because we can offer cars with over 500 km of range, even 700 km. Charging time will no longer be a problem because we can charge 80% of the car in 18 minutes. However, the charging network and its accessibility are of primary importance in the transformation ahead of us. So if there is an effort to make, beyond convincing customers through massive support to come with us, we have the issue of coverage of charging points to address. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much. For the Horizon group, Mr. Thierry Benoît.
Thank you, Madam President, Mr. Director General. First, I would like to salute your career because I am here, Mr. Director General, I would like to salute your career since you presented yourself, and to say that we can also be proud in France to have leaders with fine careers, and the precision of your remarks shows that despite everything, in terms of industry, not all is lost in our country. The first point: you began your opening remarks with the requirement of decarbonizing the automotive industry, and you ended with the electric transition, a question that has already been raised earlier, but I would like to come back to it. Should we bet everything exclusively on electricity? That is, even if we have an energy mix in France, it is still predominantly nuclear energy. Is your group's R&D department looking for other solutions? Someone mentioned hydrogen, we could mention bioethanol, co-products from agri-food activity. That's the first point. Second point: one day there will be a used electric vehicle market. How do you imagine and structure the used market? How do you imagine maintenance, and especially the issue of recycling? Finally, batteries: we naturally cite the question of decarbonizing the industry. Are batteries also virtuous, particularly the issue of rare earths or rare materials that are extracted in parts of the world very far from Europe? So this raises questions. And finally, if you have time in the two minutes you will have to answer, the question of subcontractors: today a major part of subcontractors are very far from Europe and especially from France. Do you envisage tightening links with subcontractors in France and Europe? Thank you.
This question also came up from Mr. Fugit on subcontractors. So, Mr. Director General, Mr. Deputy, thank you for your multi-energy question. First, we are not betting everything on electric with multi-energy platforms like the one we have implemented in the terminal units. We are capable of covering thermal, plug-in hybrid, hybrid, and electric. So we have a panel, a catalog of four technologies at our disposal. We have also worked on e-fuel; all our cars are e-fuel compatible, that's important. And I am in the process of moving to hydrogen for fleets of utility vehicles to prepare the future. The problem with hydrogen is that it has two characteristics: first, it doesn't like contact with air, and second, a hydrogen refueling session costs 2 million. So in a visible horizon, hydrogen mobility is more for companies, societies, administrations than for the general public. But we have it in scope; it cannot be a mass movement in the short term. The only mass movement accessible now is electric, period, if we want to be zero emission. If we don't want to be zero emission, that's another story. That's the first subject. Second subject: you raise the question of used vehicles. We are sending more and more to dealerships. One of the subjects, if you were to vote for a social leasing next year, I implore you to include the used vehicles that are currently at your dealerships in the possibility of making offers to the final customer. An electric used car costs 15,000 euros, not 40,000. So if we can say we help you on new vehicles but also on used vehicles in stock at the launch date of social leasing or such bonus that will accompany it, that will be very important for dealers and customers. Third, you spoke about recycling, priority one. So we have set up an entire recycling industry. A battery lasts 15 years, okay. So from the moment we reach the first battery deadlines, we will have the capacity to recycle almost 100% of the battery pack, which will limit pressure on rare earths, obviously, on which we absolutely need to do the work. So these three points are priority one in terms of strategy, and we have addressed them. But if there is one subject on which we can act in terms of tipping point, it is to help dealer networks to include used vehicles in the offers that will be made to the final customer at the beginning of 2025. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Director General. For the Lot group, Christophe Nelen.
Thank you, Madam President, to leave you maximum time to answer. Four very quick questions. European regulations oblige you, due to the various fines that could be given, to this transition towards all-electric. What financial and/or administrative aid could Europe put in place to support you? Second point: in France and particularly in the Vosges, we have many subcontractors in the automotive industry, and particularly of Stellantis. What is your vision on maintaining and redeveloping reindustrialization, especially with subcontractors in France and in the territories? Third question: concern about the development of chargers. What could be the role of manufacturers in this development, particularly in rural and mountainous areas such as the Vosges massif? I take up the remarks of my colleague Morel earlier. And fourth question: the impact of the American election. We already had the Trump presidency for 4 years. What could be the impact, in your view, given this first experience, given the declarations on French industry, on the French automotive industry, and on Stellantis in particular? Thank you very much, Mr. Director General.
Easy on the Trump election this morning. But listen, if we have the answer, we will have a quick answer, I imagine, on these subjects. On the United States, we are ready to face any eventuality. That is, we cover the US market both with an electric offer that will be massive across all our brands: Jeep, Dodge, Chrysler, and RAM. We will be massively potentially electric and also massively potentially hybrid. So no problem responding to one or the other regulatory evolution in the United States. Obviously, it will have to be agile and fast, otherwise we won't do it. But we are capable of adapting. You know, in this world that changes from one day to the next, we can handle almost all possible regulatory evolutions, whatever the states, because in the US it won't be one policy but several policies corresponding to different states. We are actually leaders in electrification in the United States, it should be noted. So we'll see how it goes, but we are adaptable. Important point: the charging network. Here, I think an alliance between us industrials and you, I would say local authorities, is fundamental. I think in the areas where you operate, there are very few charging points. So we have two major tracks: first, that public authorities push for electrification of these areas, both on normal charging points and on fast charging points, especially on highways near you. I advocate a lot for helping companies to equip themselves with charging points on their parking lots where they are. Why? Because when you live in an apartment building, it's not easy to charge when you're on the third floor, and it's easier to charge when you're at work. So I think we have work to do with entrepreneurs to be able to offer them solutions that themselves allow these same entrepreneurs to tell their employees how to solve their charging problem at our company. Suppliers, I talked about them, we will probably talk about them again before the end of this session. I assure you that each of them today is supported either in improving their competitiveness or in changing their activity to follow our evolution. Some will follow, some will not. We know it, you know it, you hear it every day. And we will try to limit the impact, but we cannot deny the impact it will have on the industrial supplier fabric around us. Thank you, Mr. Director General.
Thank you, Mr. Director General. For the GDR group, Mr. André Chassigne.
Mr. Director General, Madam Director. For several years, generalist car manufacturers have developed a strategy of moving upmarket for their vehicles, and the same policy is followed for electric cars: cars that are always bigger, heavier, and of course more expensive, with the consequence of being inaccessible to most households. A strategy that favors high value-added production, which is also found in companies like Michelin. The choice by manufacturers to develop SUVs, to the point of devoting 42% of their advertising budget to them for French manufacturers alone, illustrates this drift. At the same time, the employment situation continues to deteriorate: judicial liquidations like at Ma France, closures like Eurocast and Eurostel Systems, and social plans are accumulating. Particularly for employees of subcontracting companies, as has been said. Given the billions in aid you have received, and despite your previous answers, I want to come back to the social responsibility of your company as an order giver but also as an industrial actor. You announce, if I understood correctly, 1 million cars manufactured in France, but what objectives in terms of employment? You take no commitment to stop site closures like Poissy Stellantis, which we talked about in subcontracting. You show no will to massively redirect production towards the vehicles that the majority of modest and middle-income households are waiting for: light, sober, durable, and inexpensive cars. After the decline in Stellantis sales and given the aid received, are you questioning a reorientation of your strategy towards responding to the needs and challenges of reindustrialization? Thank you very much, Mr. Director General.
The answer is yes, Mr. Deputy. Attention, the microphone. The answer is yes, Mr. Deputy. We are every day questioning how to maintain not only the industrial fabric but also develop it. So to answer the first part of the question: if there are SUVs, big SUVs in France, it's because there are customers, between us, right? So I think I can say that more than 55% of the market today is driven by SUVs, whether from the intermediate segment or the 3008, 5008, C3 Aircross segment. If there are SUVs, it's because we have customers, and it turns out that these cars correspond to what the majority of our customers want. But having said that, let's go back a few years. When I launched the 208 in France, it was thermal. The 208 was 2018. The 208 cost 15,900 euros in 2018. Yes, the first 208 was 2012, but in 2018, the second 208. The price gap between a 2018 electric 208 and today is quite significant. That's why in parallel we developed a platform called Smart Car, which will allow us, for example with the C3, with Fiat, with Opel, to have car proposals under 20,000 euros. So we will find those price ranges you talk about that are accessible to the final customer. We will have cars in the coming weeks, already among us, for less than 20,000 to be able to respond to customer concerns. That's fundamental. We will thus have erased in a short time a good part of the cost price gap between a thermal vehicle and an electric vehicle while moving towards decarbonization. So this challenge is a challenge of speed. We are there, we may not be fast enough, but we are there, and I can tell you we will not let go. Because I know, I have children who buy cars too, that beyond 20,000, 25,000 for people starting out in life or for people who don't necessarily have much money, we are at the limit and beyond 150 euros per month, we are at the limit. So we must have an offer at that level. We will have it, we have it, and we will have it massively at the very beginning of 2025. It will just be necessary that we also support households so that they find a charging solution nearby, so that we can commit to taking back their car in 3 years with social leasing, and so that we can give them the possibility, if they don't want to return their car, to continue their financing. So the car under 20,000 we have it, and we will continue. And then the China question. The China question: we can pretend not to see it, but we can also attack it. What we said is we take 21% of a Chinese company there, and that way at least we control the flow that comes to us anyway. Don't imagine for a second stopping it; they are here, and they are here on passenger vehicles and utility vehicles. A Lig Motors today is 18,900 euros today. So Stellantis in Europe and France selling a car at 18,900 euros answers the question. Thank you, Mr. Director General.
Thank you, Mr. Director General. Next, for the UDR group, Charles àoncle.
Thank you, thank you, Madam President, thank you, Mr. Director General, for your very clear presentation. Your group, which carries the heritage of one of the jewels of our industry, has always been illustrated by its permanent quest for innovation. I think of the fundamental intuition of your founder, Armand Peugeot, who knew how to leave behind coffee grinders to take the turn of the automobile. However, in recent months and again this week, the press has reported rather worrying technical failures. On the one hand, the PureTech petrol engines are experiencing accelerated aging. On the other hand, the Takata airbags, for which you organized a recall, it seems, on May 3. You are undoubtedly aware of all those motorists affected by these breakdowns; they are involuntarily prohibited from using their means of transport. I have been contacted by some in my constituency, and they all told me of their distress at seeing their vehicles immobilized without any compensation. And last week, L'Argus informed us that some of your hybrid gearboxes had serious anomalies. So, Mr. Director General, how do you explain these chronic dysfunctions on a large scale? In your opinion, would there have been a deficit of investment at Stellantis, the unfortunate consequences of which we deplore today? Did the legitimate strategy of reducing production costs taken by Mr. Tavares also lead to cutting credits allocated to quality control? And finally, my last question, and you will have enough time to answer, perhaps the most important: in your opinion, did the imperative of all-electric planned for 2035 lead you to slow down your investments in petrol models to the point of even compromising their own safety? For all these answers, Mr. Director General, thank you very much.
Thank you very much, Mr. Director General. Real subject, priority one. Is there a trade-off between quality and productivity? The answer is no. We have three subjects in front of us. The first relates to the airbags you mentioned, a Takata airbag failure. This dates from 2012, a Japanese supplier, moreover bankrupt, having disappeared from the radar. We are just cleaning up what happened in 2012. It has nothing to do with any investment choice; moreover, Carlos at the time was not even the boss of PSA. So we have something that fell on us, and not just us. And we made a commitment to customers: we said we have 500,000 customers in the street. We are going to pass the milestone of 300,000 repairs carried out by November 15. We follow it every week, and I ask you to believe that when the airbags are at the dealership, the dealer or agent has 5 days to do the work for the final customer, precisely to not immobilize customers. We have put 35,000 cars at disposal in France, used vehicles, but at the disposal of customers to guarantee their mobility, so that we can manage the mobility they need during this period. And we will finish by the end of the year with 500,000 Takata airbag recalls. Japanese airbag, it's not low-cost, it's Japanese, it's just a failure of this supplier that affected many people. PureTech: PureTech is an engine that was elected twice, I think, Engine of the Year in 2017-2018. So there too, designed well before the birth of Stellantis, and on which we had a subject. So first, we must be clear: we are affected by this because really, for me, Peugeot, Citroën, Stellantis, carrying quality as being priority number one of our concerns, to see it tarnished at this moment is not what we wanted. So what we do is intervene as quickly as possible with our customers, first. Second, we open and offer an exceptional warranty coverage of 10 years on the engines that are taken back at 175,000 km, okay? And we will make sure to be very close to those who have suffered with us on this kind of subject. So if you want, these two subjects, which probably illustrate the two key points of your intervention, are subjects that were born prior to any investment decision that are ours. Moreover, you know, we have to put something like 6 or 7 billion euros in R&D, and we are fully into innovation. So we are not making a trade-off; we just took the wave and are in full swing, to be clear. At the moment, we are in full swing. Thank you, Mr. Director.
Thank you, Mr. Director. Perhaps I can now leave you some speaking time to answer some other questions you haven't been able to answer. I think, for example, of training for new professional skills. There was also a question several times about subcontractors: is it possible for you to have more recourse to French and European subcontractors? I think there were many questions about the future of sites, even if you have started to answer, not only on assembly sites but also on component and organ sites of vehicles. Questions obviously also on, to take up the question, the responsibility of order givers. And I think there were also several questions asked about the distribution of Stellantis group profits between shareholder remuneration, employees, and productive investment. I hope I'm not forgetting. Anyway, there will also be individual questions asked to you, including by group speakers who have already spoken. I give you the floor, and then we will move to individual questions. Thank you.
Retraining and training: we have 42,000 employees in the Stellantis perimeter, a certain number of whom are in contact with the electric energy transition. So to give you an order of magnitude, we have 900 training courses corresponding to a certain number of skills and retraining that were implemented in 2023, and since 2022, rather 12,000 French employees have been trained and cultured in electric. That's true for us, true for the networks too, because when you are in a dealership's after-sales service, you know that in order of magnitude, you will first lose 30% of the hours you sell today, and half or even three-quarters of your staff will need to be configured and able to repair an electric vehicle in the next 5 years. So the effort is massive. We have a unit entirely dedicated to this conversion in terms of training, and we have an obsession: that no one finds themselves in a situation where they would be just placed in an impossibility to write a professional future due to this energy transition. So I can tell you that this is part of the top priorities in the house in terms of training. You spoke about profit distribution. I think we have always had at heart to make an equitable sharing between employee remuneration on one side and shareholder remuneration on the other. That's what I think Carlos always said: if he had to distribute 100, he always did 50-50. That's how we approached the file. I hope it's the right one, but in any case, that's how he always worked. I heard questions about his remuneration as well. You talked about it. Let me just cite his response: he said two things: one, 90% of my remuneration is variable; two, legislate and I will adapt. So Carlos Tavares is a legalist; he will do what the legislation asks him to do. Those are the few answers I can give to your subjects this morning. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much. I think there is still the question of subcontractors. Perhaps you can take them up in the individual questions, because I see, I hear that the question remains, particularly of relocation at the level of subcontractors. So I propose we move to individual questions. I must tell you that since this morning in the bureau, we have decided unanimously on a new rule: individual questions of one minute and a direct answer from you of one minute. If that suits you, I will be strict on speaking time, because we have nearly twenty requests for individual intervention already. I must tell you that we are particularly numerous this morning, which proves the interest we have in this hearing. So I begin with Mr. Lionel Tivoli.
Madam President, Mr. Director General. Driving an electric car is now the new injunction, one more from the French government. Beyond being trendy, it would be an imperative to save the planet, from which no one should deviate. But what is the reality on the ground for many of our compatriots? First, a often considerable purchase cost of the vehicle, between 30,000 and 50,000 euros excluding high-end models. Added to this are difficulties related to charging stations, as you said earlier, range, and of course the cost of energy. Driving electric is good, driving safely is better, and that's where we start to worry: airbag problems that deploy unexpectedly, you gave the answer earlier, but risk of gearbox lockup, vehicle written off after even a minor collision due to the impossibility of replacing batteries that cannot be dismantled. These multiple malfunctions are particularly worrying given the financial sacrifices many of our compatriots make to adapt to the requirements of the automotive fleet transition. What guarantee can you give us today, as a manufacturer, regarding the reliability of your equipment? Thank you.
The answer is 8 years and 15 years on the battery. So the coverage in order of magnitude. The failure rate of an electric vehicle compared to a thermal vehicle is divided by 3 in order of magnitude. That's not true everywhere and not true for all products, but as soon as you have no rotating parts, you have no defects. So Takata is not linked to electrification because it's thermal. But in terms of defect generation in electric, it is clearly more reliable than thermal. It must be said for the future, it's just obvious. So we guarantee the batteries for 8 years, there are even possible warranty extensions up to 15 years. So the question of electric reliability will not be an issue. What will be an issue, which is still ahead of us and must be treated together once again, is the charging stations, the charging network. If you are not in Paris and you want to be 80% electric, and if you want to put forces on something, please push charging stations everywhere. And once we have solved that, again, whoever has driven an electric car will not go back, because objectively in terms of torque, road behavior, even inertia, it is better than thermal. Thank you, Mr. Director General.
Thank you, Mr. Director General. Mr. Jean-Luc Fugit.
I hope you can come back to the question of subcontractors. I also wanted to address the question of hydrogen with you, to come back to this subject. Indeed, France is one of the first countries to have equipped itself with a hydrogen plan in June 2018, then a national strategy in 2020, a strategy that must be revised, and I hope the revision will be presented soon. Moreover, last year Stellantis entered the capital of Symbio, whose development in my department of Rhône we are proud of, if I understood correctly what your president declared at the time. Symbio's roadmap, which works on the development of fuel cells, fits perfectly with Stellantis' plan concerning the deployment of hydrogen solutions for light utility vehicles. Hence my very simple double question: where are you on hydrogen and light utility vehicles, and what do you expect or fear from the revision of the national hydrogen strategy in terms of mobility? Thank you very much, Mr. Director General.
