Lippstadt, June 25, 2019. With a new innovation competition, the internationally operating automotive supplier HELLA is strengthening its cooperation with selected, high-performance suppliers. At the same time, HELLA is further expanding its own innovative strength. The aim of the competition “HELLA Co-Innovation Platform” (HIP) is to involve particularly innovative suppliers in the early phases of product development and thus jointly advance the development of new, forward-looking technologies.
"Innovation does not always succeed on its own, but becomes more and more a team task. This also includes our suppliers as potential partners," said HELLA CEO Dr. Rolf Breidenbach at the award ceremony. "Against this background, I am delighted to be able to award three particularly powerful and innovative suppliers with whom we will now jointly work on advanced development projects in important areas."
The companies AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik AG, HDO Druckguß- und Oberflächentechnik GmbH and Infineon Technologies AG have now been honoured by HELLA as particularly innovative suppliers at an awards ceremony at the company's headquarters in Lippstadt. They convinced above all with their innovative strength, cost-effectiveness and cooperation potential with regard to HELLA's product and development portfolio. In the next step, HELLA intends to further intensify its cooperation with the three partners and jointly drive forward concrete development projects in the areas of steering electronics, actuators and 48 Volt voltage converters.
The HELLA Co-Innovation Platform was initiated for the first time at the end of last year in cooperation between the automotive supplier's purchasing and pre-development departments. Numerous companies from various industries took part in the competition and presented their innovation proposals to a jury consisting of members of the Electronics executive board and further experts.