“Made in Europe: what benefits for daily mobility?

The Mobility Sphere lunch conference, hosted by MEP Thomas Pellerin-Carlin, took place on Tuesday, 5 May 2026, at the European Parliament in Brussels.

Building on the discussions from our last edition of the Brussels event of may 2025, this event will be held under the theme: “Made in Europe: what benefits for daily mobility? Reconciling industrial sovereignty with the need for clean and scalable public transport vehicles.” The discussion will focus on concrete solutions to tackle European industrial strategy and competitiveness, with a particular emphasis on rail and road public transport.

• Thomas Pellerin-Carlin, Member of the European Parliament, Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) ;
• Arthur Corbin, Business Advisor to the Executive Vice-President for Prosperity and Industrial Strategy, European Commission ;
• Barbara Lenz, Former Director of the German Institute of Transport Research in Berlin and Professor of Transport Geography at Humboldt University ;
• Philipp Lausberg, Senior Policy Analyst, European Policy Centre ;
• Aitor Galarza, Strategy and Finance Director at CAF Group / Solaris.
• François Gemenne – IPCC Lead Author, Scientific Advisor, The Mobility Sphere.

Europe faces a conundrum involving high stakes: how to accelerate the shift to zero‑emission buses, trams and trains while building and protecting Europe’s production capacity that is struggling in the face of global competition, notably from China.

At a Mobility Sphere meeting in May 2026 at the European Parliament in Brussels, industry leaders, policymakers and researchers described urgent demand for clean vehicles alongside a fragile European industrial base, and called on EU authorities to use existing tools more forcefully to protect and rekindle domestic manufacturing as markets harden, distortions grow and fair competition is under threat.

“China is pouring vast amounts of subsidies into electric vehicle value chains, into raw materials, into batteries and so on,” observed Philipp Lausberg, Senior Policy Analyst at the European Policy Centre.

Aitor Galarza, Strategy and Finance Director at CAF Group / Solaris,  quoted OECD data showing that Chinese companies in rail “receive more than 70% of the subsidies in the world.”

The result, several speakers warned, is a capacity mismatch. Thierry Mallet, CEO of the Transdev Group, said that  “if we want more electrical buses, our industrial tool is not there to deliver those buses.”

Speakers urged a two‑pronged response: offensive demand creation to regenerate industry, and defensive enforcement to ensure fair competition.

Calling the EU’s Foreign Subsidy Regulation “a magnificent tool’,” several participants argued it should be applied more widely and adapted to sector realities so non‑EU subsidies that distort procurement are effectively countered.

The need to strengthen the single market was another recurring theme. MEP Thomas Pellerin‑Carlin framed the paradox: “If you want simplification for companies, you need more EU regulation. Why? Because the problem is coming from fragmented, direct national rules that change all the time.”

Panelists said harmonised standards and fewer national deviations would reduce costs, shorten delivery times and allow manufacturers to scale across borders.

Public procurement surfaced as the most immediate lever. Panelists reminded the room that procurement represents roughly 15% of European GDP and can be used to provide foreseeable demand for European suppliers. “When it comes to public procurement, there's a case to be made to move away from just price criteria,” Lausberg said.

Policy coherence and finance were the third pillar. Speakers called for coordinated EU and member‑state investment to de‑risk capital‑intensive projects — batteries, gigafactories and factory modernisation — and for procurement, standards and financing to be aligned so deployment does not stall while capacity is rebuilt.

Arthur Corbin, Business Advisor to the Executive Vice-President for Prosperity and Industrial Strategy at the European Commission, said the EU should deploy a mix of “offensive and defensive tools” — strategic demand creation via procurement and smart protection where markets are distorted.

Meanwhile, pragmatism was seen as crucial, because operators must run services today, and not at some distant point in the future. “If I want an electric bus tomorrow, I cannot have it. Full stop,” said Antoine Grange, Transdev’s Europe CEO, urging policymakers to balance industrial ambitions with the operational reality of fleets and routes.

Speakers returned repeatedly to a single point: Europe already possesses legal levers — procurement rules, the Foreign Subsidies Regulation, investment screening and the Industrial Accelerator Act — but the difference will be political will and timely enforcement. “Decisions have to be taken today, they have to be put in place tomorrow,” Galarza insisted.

Failure to act, participants warned, could amount to ceding the bus depots and battery plants of tomorrow to non‑EU players. As MEP Thomas Pellerin‑Carlin put it, the mobility sector is central to the climate transition and cannot be allowed to stall — otherwise Europe will be “stuck in the middle of the transition”.

On a cautiously optimistic note, Corbin reminded the room of the strategic alignment between climate and industry: “There is no decarbonisation without strong European industries and there are no strong European industries without decarbonisation.”

The task for Brussels, speakers urged, is to convert that alignment into enforceable rules, predictable demand and scaled financing, as fast as possible.