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This is a partnership of five major European Transport Research Associations: ECTRI, EURNEX, FEHRL, FERSI, HUMANIST. It operates as a non-legal entity in the form of partnership and is supported by its partners both financially and in-kind. It organises events, and takes initiatives, related mainly to horizontal strategic issues of Transport Research in Europe and promoting the European Research Area in the field of Transport. 

The European Transport Research Alliance – ETRA is a partnership Organisation created, on September 20th 2012, by five Transport Research Associations: ECTRI (European Conference of Transport Research Institutes), EURNEX (the European rail Research Network of Excellence), FEHRL (Forum of European National Highway Research Laboratories), FERSI (Forum of European Road Safety Institutes), and HUMANIST (the Human centered design Network for Information Society Technologies).

Its strategic objective is, to: “work towards promoting further cooperation, coordination of activities, and common focus in European transport research provision, as part of the process and in full alignment with the objectives of creating the European Research Area  in the field of Transport”.    

Automotive OEM (Heavy duty trucks, light/medium commertial vehicles, passenger vehicles, diesel engines for trucks and marine industry)

Ford OTOSAN is a leading automotive OEM in Turkey, designing and manufacturing vehicles (commercial, passenger) and covering a with wide service network.

Founded in 1959 as “OTOSAN A.Ş.”, Ford OTOSAN was the first automotive company in Turkey. In 1966, it manufactured the first domestic passenger car Anadol, which was designed by Turkish engineers, and in 1986 the first diesel engine. In 2009, it was the first Turkish company to export automotives to the USA and automotive export leader 5 times in Turkey.

Ford OTOSAN has the largest R&D center of the Turkish automotive industry, and the 3rd largest R&D center of Ford Motor Company, with approximately 1,300 engineers developing advanced technologies and products to dominate in global competition. It is the global design and engineering center for Ford’s heavy commercial vehicles and diesel engines. The Sancaktepe R&D Center, established in 2014, replacing the Gebze R&D Center, pioneers the engineering of Ford’s global diesel engine production as well as heavy duty trucks. Ford OTOSAN’s R&D investments continue in parallel with new vehicle and engine projects. 

Turkey’s commercial powerhouse, Ford OTOSAN accounted for 57% of Turkey’s commercial vehicle production and 61% of commercial vehicle exports in 2013. With a capacity of 330,000 commercial vehicles and 66,000 engines at Kocaeli and İnönü Plants, Ford OTOSAN reached a capacity of 415,000 units at the end of 2014.

In 2013, Ford OTOSAN started to manufacture the new Ford Cargo truck and Ford Transit Custom, which was “2013 International Van of the Year”. This year, investment towards the production of the new  9-liter and 13-liter Ecotorq engines is made, developed by Ford “EH   engineers, the intellectual property rights of which are wholly owned by Ford OTOSAN. Ford OTOSAN, continuing its R&D activities since 1961, has become an engineering center which provides employment to approximately 1300 engineers, develops and manufactures domestic engines, and provides licenses in accordance with international agreements. In 2013-14, exporting engine and heavy duty truck technology to China is achieved by means of an agreement signed with JMC, to produce under licence Ecotorq engines and Cargo heavy duty trucks in the world’s largest truck market, China.

Ford OTOSAN is experienced in complete design, validation, manufacturing and homologation phases of engine/vehicle families, as well as testing, service and after sales operations.

Automotive OEM

The Fraunhofer LBF (www.lbf.fraunhofer.de) looks back on 75 years of experience in the field of structural durability and nowadays expanded with the expertise in adaptronics, plastics and system reliability. The Fraunhofer LBF develops, evaluates and realizes customized solutions for safety relevant products with a team of more than 450 employees together with the associated Chair of System Reliability and Machine Acoustics SzM and Chair of Macromolecular Chemistry of the TU Darmstadt. In doing so, the full added value chain is considered, from the idea to the product, from the material to the system and over the full life-cycle. For the customized solutions, the LBF provides versatile test facilities on more than 17.000 m2 which are complemented by the Virtual Test Lab for numerical simulations and testing. Since 1 July 2012, the German Institute for Polymers (DKI) became a division of Fraunhofer LBF. Thus, the competences of the Fraunhofer LBF have been extended by synthesis, processing, analysis and testing of functional and engineering plastics. Furthermore, the new battery test center for evaluatiing the life-time and reliability of complete battery systems has opened April 2015. The Fraunhofer LBF is currently structured into the four divisions Structural Durability, Smart Structures, Plastics and System Reliability.

gasfill have developed an affordable personal refuelling appliance for cars and vans that use CNG (compressed natural gas) as a fuel. The appliance is aimed at the home and commercial markets and is the 'natural gas equivalent of an electric charging post'. The unit uses natural gas from the normal gas supply to a property and uses a domestic electricity supply for power. The use of CNG leads to lower fuel costs (typically up to 60%), a lower CO2 footprint (20% saving) and cleaner vehicle emissions (low NOx and no particulates). Within the EU there are currently 1.5 million vehicles using CNG with CNG cars and vans being offered by the major manufacturers (VW, Fiat etc). At the moment the users of CNG have to wait until a public access fast fill station is built in their area but these are expensive, hence rollout is relatively slow and limits the growth of the CNG market. gasfill's unit avoids this issue and provides a way of acelerating market growth. gasfill are now seeking partners/investors who can help to ramp up the commercialistion of their product.

The 3 stage oil free compressor in the unit has been developed by gasfill, is patented and can be used for other gases. gasfill are also looking to license their compressor technology for use with gases other than methane