Afcar Italia makes its debut at Autopromotec
Welcomed by President Mauro Severi, on May 26 at Autopromotec, Afcar Italia, an alliance between some of the most important Italian organizations in the independent aftermarket supply chain, was presented, with the goal of repeating nationally the positive experience and results achieved by Afcar Europe. Afcar Italia's "mission" is to develop and support Afcar Europe's initiatives in Italy and offer its support in all necessary activities with national institutions. These include supporting the MVBER, access to technical information and related costs, cybersecurity and access to in-car data and functions. All of this in order to finalize and promote real and effective competition in the automotive aftermarket and mobility services with specific European legislation for the automotive sector. Afcar Italia aims to be a privileged contact with the authorities, policy makers and other stakeholders on the above-mentioned issues, thus enabling the independent aftermarket to be unified and give greater political weight to its demands. To date, Afcar Italia consists of Adira, an association of Italian spare parts distributors; AICA, an association of Italian Garage Equipment Manufacturers; and Tekné Consulting representing technical data suppliers. The hope, however, is to expand the scope of participants to include all other associations in the supply chain as soon as possible, and contacts are already underway.
The case against Fca over Obd access reaches the European Court of Justice
The European Court of Justice has been hearing the dispute over Obd diagnostic port access between Atu and Carglass on the one hand and Fiat Chrysler on the other. Atu and Carglass, two major independent garage networks, filed a lawsuit against Fca in the Regional Court of Cologne in Germany, claiming that Fca is illegally make it more difficult and costly to access the Obd interface of its vehicles, thus breaking current legislations. Vehicle manufacturers, in fact, are legally obliged by EU regulations to allow independent garages access to the Obd interface, without which modern vehicles cannot be repaired. However, according to the plaintiffs, more and more manufacturers are making this access more difficult; that is why they are now taking this legal action against Fiat Chrysler, as an exemplary case of a situation where other car manufacturers are introducing similar restrictions, which are also illegal and arbitrary. In this case, Fca requires the mechanic to register in its site and have a constant Internet connection with the Fca server, which is impermissible according to the plaintiffs. The case was originally filed in the Regional Court of Cologne but, following the hearing, the court recognized the consistency of the claim but at the same time also noted a lack of clarity in the relevant EU regulation (the 2018/858), which is still evolving in some of its clauses. This finding, as well as the scope of the regulation being at the EU level, led the plaintiffs to request the Regional Court of Cologne to refer the case to the European Court of Justice. The step is crucial, especially because the European Court's ruling will have value for the entire EU and not just Germany as in the case of the Cologne Regional Court. The timing of the European Court's judgment, according to the party lawyers, is expected to be quite rapid; there is talk of 12 months from the briefing of the case, which is currently taking place.
