Automotive Skills Alliance turns 5 and keeps strong focus on skills for Europe’s mobility future
Europe’s automotive and mobility ecosystem is undergoing profound change—driven by digitalisation, electrification, automation, and new business models. To stay competitive, Europe must ensure that people and their skills evolve in step with these transformations. A modern skills architecture must link policy, research, and practice through coordinated action—such as strategic foresight of competence needs, continuous skills intelligence from industry and labour markets, and flexible, modular learning pathways including micro-credentials. It also requires empowered educators with access to new technologies, cross-border recognition of skills to support mobility, and the promotion of STEM and digital careers as drivers of Europe’s green and digital transition. By aligning skills, innovation, and industry, Europe can turn transformation into opportunity—ensuring a competitive, inclusive, and human-centred automotive future.
The spark of a common vision – Five years ago, a shared vision brought together Europe’s leading automotive and mobility actors. The challenge was clear: the sector was entering the fastest transformation in its history, driven by digitalisation, electrification, and automation — and skills would be the key to navigating it.
From that vision, the Automotive Skills Alliance (ASA) unites industry, education, and public authorities to make skills a strategic pillar of industrial policy—turning innovation into sustainable value for companies, workers, and regions.The ASA was born – first as a part of the European Pact for Skills action, and later, in January 2022, ASA was officially established as a non-profit organization founded by ACEA, CECRA, CLEPA and ETRMA. Its mission was simple but ambitious: to unite industry, education, and regions around a common goal — building the competences Europe needs for its mobility future.
Today, ASA celebrates five years of collaboration, impact, and growth. What began as a bold idea has become a living network of more than 120 members across 26 countries, driving forward the skills transformation of an entire ecosystem.
Building a shared vision – since its early days, ASA’s strength lay in bringing people together — industrial companies, training providers, social partners, different organisations and regional representatives — around one table. It built bridges between regions, sectors, and education systems to create a European partnership for skills on the scale that had never existed before. These actions soon grew into tangible initiatives. By connecting projects, regions, and policy dialogues, ASA helped transform fragmented efforts into a coordinated European movement for skills.
From Vision to Actions and Results
Over five years, ASA has turned its mission into measurable impact. Among its major milestones:
1. Strengthening Collaboration – Over the years, it has been a real privilege collaborating with partners on numerous proposals and mainstreaming initiatives with tangible impact. This continuous effort to strengthen collaboration has enabled partners to exchange best practices and address common challenges more effectively.
In 2025, these efforts culminated in the establishment of a Regional Skills Partnership, giving regions a stronger voice in Europe’s skills agenda and enhancing the overall collaboration framework developed since 2024. ASA’s collaboration structure now connects partners across four main areas — Technology, Education, Social Aspects and Regional Implementation — ensuring coordinated progress and cross-sectoral alignment.
Key initiatives include e.g. Battery, and Innovation Agent working groups under the Technology Committee; the Key Competences, Hydrogen Forum under Education; and the Regional Implementation Working Group supported by regular study visits and exchanges among European regions. Together, these networks form a dynamic ecosystem where industry, education and training providers, and regional authorities co-develop skills strategies for the green and digital transitions. These networks are not just structures — they are communities of practice where people exchange experience, learn from one another, and co-create new solutions.
2. Advancing Skills intelligence and Learning – Understanding which skills are needed — and how fast they evolve — has always been at the heart of ASA’s work, grounded by creation of the reference definition of job roles and skills – building the automotive competence matrix – through its working groups and projects. ASA has helped map emerging competences and connect them with education and training offers.
One of ASA’s flagship achievements is the Skills Hub, a pan-European-wide catalogue of training courses (400+) and learning paths that supports faster access to relevant programmes and issues micro-credentials across Europe. The platform enables users to identify the skills and job roles required in the sector and find suitable courses or training providers.
The Skills Hub builds on the Digital Competence Matrix and Smart Catalogue of Training and Reference Definitions, providing a European reference for job roles and skills. This helps companies, training providers, and policymakers align their activities with evolving industry needs and ensures consistent skill recognition across the Automotive-Mobility Ecosystem.
The Skills Hub exemplifies ASA’s role in building a dynamic European skills architecture — one that connects data, learning, and policy into a living ecosystem for competence development.
Complementing the Skills Hub is the Learning Platform, which hosts online courses and MOOCs from flagship EU projects such as DRIVES, ALBATTS, TRIREME, ChemSkills, and others.
These platforms, developed and continuously expanded through European collaborations, ensure that high-quality learning opportunities reach everyone, everywhere — fostering an agile, connected, and future-ready workforce across Europe.
3. Strategic Partnerships and Connecting Stakeholders – ASA plays a key role in building strategic partnerships and connecting stakeholders across Europe through a wide range of collaborative initiatives. These include the organisation of the annual Skills (R)Evolution Conference in 2022, 2024, and 2025, with future editions already planned for 2026 and beyond. In addition, ASA organises study visits across European automotive regions — such as Stuttgart, Grand Est, and Timișoara — offering opportunities to exchange experiences, discuss regional challenges, and identify best practices in skills development.
ASA also (co-)organises several events dedicated to training activities for teachers and trainers, including the BaTT VET Forum, the Hydrogen VET Forum, and other initiatives aimed at fostering innovation in vocational education and training.
4. Representing Skills at the EU Level – The Automotive Skills Alliance (ASA) has been an active and influential voice in Europe’s industrial transformation, consistently emphasizing that Europe’s competitiveness relies on skilled people. As part of the Pact for Skills Large-Scale Partnership for the Automotive-Mobility Ecosystem, ASA has contributed to key EU policy dialogues and strategies, including the Mobility Transition Pathways, Route 35, the Action Plan for the Automotive Sector, and the Union of Skills initiative. Across these efforts, ASA has ensured that skills remain at the forefront of discussions on innovation, industrial resilience, and sustainable growth, promoting high-quality jobs that support Europe’s competitiveness. Strategic partnerships with the Automotive Regions Alliance (ARA) and CoRAI are central to ASA’s mission to align regional voices with EU-level policy agendas. Together, they have developed a practical framework for regional collaboration and policy dialogue, which has already shown tangible results at ARA conferences and ASA regional study visits. ASA takes particular pride in its active advocacy within the ARA network, where it promotes a clear and actionable agenda for regional skills cooperation. This work is further reinforced by ASA’s dedicated Working Groups on Regional Collaboration, which bring together partners regularly to exchange best practices, address shared challenges, and strengthen the European skills ecosystem.
5. Scaling Impact through Projects – The Automotive Skills Alliance (ASA) has played a pivotal role in launching, connecting, and scaling major EU projects — from DRIVES and ALBATTS to FLAMENCO, TRIREME, VOLTAGE, Cabatt, AutoCredify, and many others. Together, these initiatives are building robust frameworks for future-proof skills in key areas such as batteries, digitalisation, the circular economy, and innovation.
Through this growing project ecosystem, ASA has established itself not merely as a coordinator or partner, but as a catalyst for transformation — turning strategic visions into measurable results for regions, institutions, and individuals alike.
ASA continues to support the initiation and interconnection of projects and initiatives within and beyond its community, ensuring that efforts remain coherent, complementary, and impactful. Rather than reinventing the wheel, these projects build upon each other to drive progress across the European skills agenda.
The outcomes of ASA-supported projects — from skills mapping and battery value chain training to micro-credentials and digital learning tools — are shaping a truly future-ready workforce for the automotive and mobility sectors and beyond.Over five years, ASA has advanced the European vision for a dynamic skills architecture — aligning foresight, education, and industry needs. Its coordinated actions across intelligence, learning, educator support, lifelong learning, and recognition now form the foundation of a truly connected European skills ecosystem.
The Road Ahead: From Challenges to Vision for Year Six and Beyond
The next chapter of ASA’s journey will focus on turning Europe’s skills vision into a lasting architecture — one that ensures every innovation is matched by the competences to deploy it, everywhere in Europe.
ASA’s journey has not been without challenges — yet each obstacle has strengthened its foundations and expanded its vision. Over the past five years, partners have demonstrated how skills intelligence, agile training, and educator development can turn strategic ambitions into tangible results in classrooms, training centres, and workplaces. These collective efforts have built the groundwork for a more connected, responsive, and innovative skills ecosystem across Europe.
ASA has navigated the complexity of building a basis for European horizontal collaboration on skills within the Automotive-Mobility Ecosystem — a crucial first step toward connecting fragmented initiatives and fostering practical implementation. This experience has proven that continuous and systematic collaboration among stakeholders is essential for achieving fast, pragmatic results with a long-term vision. From supporting STEM education and soft skills to training teachers and updating curricula through real-time skills intelligence, ASA has shown that only a united approach — European, national, and regional — can drive transformation effectively. The exchange of best practices, grounded in local specificities, remains a cornerstone for sustainable progress.
Looking ahead, ASA enters its sixth year with renewed momentum and a clear purpose: connection, continuity, and consolidation. The foundations laid through alliances, projects, and regional cooperation are converging into a unified vision — a truly European skills ecosystem for the automotive and mobility sector.
The next phase will focus on:
– Scaling what works — expanding successful initiatives, training models, and collaborative practices.
– Empowering people — making lifelong learning, inclusion, and the attractiveness of the mobility sector central to transformation.
– Deepening regional and other collaboration — ensuring that no region is left behind in the twin green and digital transitions.
At the heart of this evolution lies the Automotive Mobility Ecosystem Academy (AMEA) — a virtual academy connecting education providers, industry, and learners. It will act as a central gateway for training offers, micro-credentials, and learning pathways guided by real skills needs and anchored in mutual recognition mechanisms. Strengthened by enhanced skills intelligence, ASA will continue to translate foresight into actionable strategies and bridge European ambitions with regional realities — fostering innovation, capacity, and cohesion across diverse territories.
In this new chapter, ASA stands ready to take the next big leap: shaping the future of Europe’s mobility skills ecosystem through collaboration, innovation, and shared purpose.
Special Thanks
We are deeply grateful to every member, partner, and individual who has contributed to ASA’s journey. Your dedication and passion fuel the transformation of Europe’s automotive and mobility ecosystem.
To every region, institution, company, and educator considering joining us:
The road ahead is brighter than ever. Let’s continue building resilience, innovation, and opportunity — together.