Austrian partnership is a runaway success

A3PS, or the Austrian Agency for Alternative Propulsion Systems, is a public private partnership that promotes sustainable vehicle technologies in the Austrian motor industry. It was created two years ago by the Ministry for Transport, Innovation and Technology (BMVIT), and now boasts 27 members from government and businesses.

Focus
Mr Andreas Dorda is managing director of A3PS, and also deputy head for BMVIT’s mobility and transportation technology unit. He explains that A3PS is largely focused on renewable propulsion systems and fuels.

“On the ministry side, we’re funding research into innovative transport technologies and engaging in international activities, like participating in the EU, technology platforms, and programme committees,” he says. “With A3PS, our members, who come from industry, universities and research centres, are all working in the area of propulsion systems – mainly within the automotive field, but we are interested in other modes as well: ships and railways, for example.”

Support
A3PS, which has a permanent staff of six, supports its members in four main areas.

It matches them with potential end users like public service transport providers, or fleets of public vehicles from cities and regions, promoting their new technologies.

It acts as a dissemination service for the information received daily by the ministry. “We get an enormous amount of documentation relating to transport, energy and environmental technologies,” explains Andreas. “It would be a waste of time to send out thousands of pages to all our members. Instead, we analyse the information and forward it in a very targeted way.”

The agency also examines legislation that might impact on getting new technologies to market, such as fuel taxation or security measures. It reports findings back to its members.

Finally, A3PS organises conferences. The last of these took place in Vienna on October 21s 2008, showcasing Austria’s sustainable mobility activity to international guests. The conferences provide the opportunity to promote A3PS members’ activities, demonstrate their expertise, and help form relationships between organisations. The agency also represents its members at external events.“There are so many events now that it’s impossible to attend them all,” says Andreas. “So we make posters for our members, detailing what they can do, their expertise and so on, ensuring they have a presence at important events when they are unable to be there in person.”

Broad mix
A3PS is funded jointly by the ministry and its members, which are a broad mix of industry, universities, research institutes, public authorities and SMEs. While they are based all over Austria, Andreas explains that traditionally there is a greater concentration of members in the Vienna and Graz areas as well as in Upper Austria, because these areas support the majority of Austria’s automotive industry.

The agency continues to attract new members and has, says Andreas, greatly exceeded his expectations in terms both of its popularity and its success.

“The reason is simple: we’re providing a good service,” he says. “We’re supplying an additional, highly knowledgeable workforce for our members, giving them in effect an extra team of employees and freeing them up to focus on other areas, like research and development. And being a network, it’s particularly useful for our members to work together, forming relationships with companies and organisations in the same field.”