Welcome back to the latest episode of The Future of Automotive on CBT News, where we put recent automotive and mobility news into the context of the broader themes impacting the industry. 

I’m Steve Greenfield from Automotive Ventures, and I’m glad that you could join us.

I was invited to visit Doha, Qatar this week to kickoff the Autonomous e-Mobility Forum with the keynote address for the conference.

I am trying to get out to a few international mobility-related conferences per year, to both meet potential investors, as well as early-stage companies for potential investment. 

As an example, I was over in Dubai last year to moderate the mobility stage at the GITEX Conference, the largest technology conference in the world. And, in two weeks, I’m over in Amsterdam to present at AutosBuzz, a large third-party automotive marketplace conference. 

Not surprisingly, Qatar proved to be both a fascinating country and really fun to visit. 

Qatar occupies the Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it shares its sole land border with Saudi Arabia to the south, with the rest of its territory surrounded by the Persian Gulf. 

Qatar’s terrain comprises arid desert and a long Persian Gulf shoreline of beautiful beaches and dunes. Also on the coast is the capital city, Doha, known for its futuristic skyscrapers and other ultramodern architecture inspired by ancient Islamic design. Doha is home to over 80% of the country’s inhabitants, and the land area is mostly made up of flat, low-lying desert.

In early 2017, the population of Qatar was 2.6 million, although only 313,000 of them are Qatari citizens with the remaining 2.3 million being expatriates and migrant workers.

The country has the fourth-highest GDP per capita in the world.  It is a high-income economy, backed by the world’s third-largest natural gas reserves and oil reserves. Qatar is one of the world’s largest exporters of liquefied natural gas.

Oil reserves were first discovered here only 85 years ago – back in 1939. Prior to that, the primary industry was, believe it or not, diving for pearls. Extraction of oil was, however, delayed by World War II. Oil exports thus began in 1949, and oil revenues quickly became the country’s main source of revenue. These revenues were used to fund the expansion and modernization of Qatar’s infrastructure.

So, it struck me as very ironic that a hyper wealthy country that is so dependent on the export of fossil fuels is at the same time so aggressive pursuing vehicle electrification and autonomy. 

E-Mobility in the wider context of global sustainability and energy diversification efforts has been at the forefront of international governments’ and industry considerations for a number of years.

Autonomous, or driverless, e-Mobility can be outlined as the next level of technological innovation in the sustainable mobility space. While imperative for a sustainable future, both dimensions, electricity-powered vehicles and driverless mobility, remain in a research and development phase, technologically, as well as from a policy perspective.

The Autonomous e-Mobility Forum was designed to bring together an international network of senior officials, policy and technology experts, including speakers and representatives from government, industry, academia, the media, and hundreds of attendees. It will provide a timely platform for stakeholders to gather and develop know-how and recommendations toward the actual implementation of autonomous e-Mobility in a real-world setting.

It was exciting to see how Qatar has a very ambitious 2030 plan to drive both vehicle electrification and autonomy. Much of this momentum began as a result of the country’s transformation in preparation for the 2022 FIFA Soccer World Cup. 

The Qatar 2030 National Plan is has been launched to serve as a clear roadmap for Qatar’s future.

The Qatar National Vision 2030 aims to direct Qatar towards a balance between developmental needs and the protection of its natural environment, whether land, sea or air.

For example, they’ve already converted over 70% of their transportation buses to electric, with a goal to get to 100%, and their light rail system is all electric. 

They also have aggressive targets to transition to autonomous vehicles.

In addition to their aggressive focus on making the transition to electrification and autonomy, the country is increasingly focused on investing in venture capital firms. 

Back in February of this year, the Qatar Investment Authority announced the launch Qatar’s first venture capital Fund of Funds, a strategic investment program to foster innovation in Qatar.

The Fund of Funds program will invest more than USD $1 billion in international and regional venture capital funds.

The program will have two key objectives. It will generate market-level commercial returns in line with QIA’s mandate to secure sustainable, long-term returns to the people of Qatar. At the same time, it will support the sustainable development of a vibrant VC and start-up ecosystem in line with Qatar’s National Development Strategy, which seeks to increase the number of startups and the availability of VC funding in the local market.

The program will aim to attract leading international VC funds and entrepreneurs both to Qatar and the wider GCC region, bringing deep VC and start-up expertise, and contributing to the growth of a local and region base of venture capitalists and founders. 

Back to this week’s conference, I was asked to both kickoff the forum with a keynote presentation during which I provided the audience with a framework to think about the future of mobility, as well as moderate the final panel discussion, to recap the conference for attendees. 

I was very impressed with the conference, I learned a lot, and had chance to have a number of high-quality meetings while I was here. 

It was my first time in Qatar, but I look forward to getting back for future conferences. 

Companies to watch

So, with that, let’s transition to Our Companies to Watch.

Every week we highlight interesting companies in the automotive technology space to keep an eye on. If you read my weekly Intel Report, we showcase a company to watch, and take the opportunity here to share that company with you.

18 Wheels

Today, our new company to watch is 18 Wheels.

You need to see the video of this solution to believe it.

18 Wheels offers technology changing the world of all-terrain vehicles

18 Wheels offers a patented suspension system comprising 18 wheels each with an electric motor and independent sprung.

Environmentally friendly, it leaves no trace on the ground and effortlessly overcomes obstacles without causing any damage.

Becaues the distribution of load and force across 18 motors in independently suspended wheels, the unique suspension system doesn’t damage the soil, and it’s suitable for all soil types, temperatures, and seasons

If you’d like to learn more about 18 Wheels, you can check them out at www.18wheels.fi

So that’s it for this week’s Future of Automotive segment. 

If you’re an AutoTech entrepreneur working on a solution that helps car dealerships, we want to hear from you. We are actively investing out of our DealerFund.

If you’re interested in joining our Investment Club to make direct investments into AutoTech and Mobility startups, please join. There is no obligation to start seeing our deal flow, and we continue to have attractive investment deals available to our members.

Don’t forget to check out my book, “The Future of Automotive Retail,” which is available on Amazon.com. And keep an eye out for my new book, “The Future of Mobility”, which is almost done, and will be out soon.

Thanks (as always) for your ongoing support and for tuning into CBT News for this week’s Future of Automotive segment. We’ll see you next week!