As the demand for personalization and sustainability in automotive interiors continues to grow, this year’s Automotive Interiors Expo North America introduced a two-day Innovation Showcase and one-day InteriVision Summit alongside the exhibition to help keep industry professionals abreast of trends and find solutions to enhance product quality and brand differentiation.
InteriVision Summit
The new summit facilitated discussions on human-centric design philosophy, the evolution of the smart cockpit, mobility for all and the creative synergy between engineering and design. Speakers from VW Design Center, Faurecia, Pebble Mobility, Yanfeng Technology and JLR discussed the evolving landscape of interior design, presenting their products and philosophies to the audience of designers and engineers.
David Muyres, mobility futurist and chief commercial officer at Streetscope, opened the summit with a presentation titled ‘What is safe in our future mobility world?’ “Automotive interiors drive the buying decisions of consumers,” he said. It’s great to see InteriVision shine a spotlight on interiors and how they are so important to this industry and future consumer satisfaction. I appreciated the opportunity to share thoughts about what is safe and what will evolve in this ever-changing automotive interiors industry.”
Lori Mavis, associate director of product management at Publicis Sapient, explored pioneering features from the 1970s to the present day and the trends shaping the smart cockpits of today and tomorrow. “Our journey through the evolution of smart cockpit technology showcased not just how far we’ve come but also the exciting possibilities that lie ahead. By integrating cutting-edge innovations like AI and augmented reality, we’re not only enhancing driver safety and experience but also redefining what it means to be connected on the road.”
Page Beermann, head of design at Pebble Mobility, was delighted to be at the summit: “I decided to speak at InteriVision primarily because I wanted to introduce Pebble to this audience. It’s not a well-known company yet and it’s got a great product offering, so exposing it to a world of engineers and designers is beneficial, as well as to get feedback. We’re still at the development stage where we want to understand perceptions on its futuristic appearance.”
Rodrigo Galdino was also pleased to be presenting. “As the lead designer for interiors at Volkswagen Design Center in California, I am responsible for all design activities in all the interior aspects for the vehicles in North America,” he said. “I came with a mission to demystify design for engineers, suppliers, people across the ecosystem, to help them understand what design is and our role. It’s very inspiring to speak to this audience and have this connection between design and engineering to make them understand we are part of the same team.”
Other highlights included Maggie Kasper, advanced sales manager at Faurecia Interior Systems, discussing leveraging automotive interior surfaces for an intuitive user experience; Nishatha Nagarajan, technical specialist for semiconductor engineering at JLR, talking about ADAS and UX-driven semiconductor advances and AI in automotive; and Nick Flannery, senior engineer at Toyota Boshoku America, with an overview of TBA’s vision for future mobility, encompassing its current products and capabilities and highlighting its focus on creating accessible and inclusive mobility.
Yanfeng presented at the summit and also had a booth in the exhibition hall. The company’s CTO, Patrick Nebout, said, “We’re very happy to be at the InteriVision Summit to present to our customers and partners our visions of the future of interiors for electric vehicles. We presented at the summit as our customers want better value from their experience in cars. It’s also great to have a demonstration at our booth that we can present to partners and discuss around real products, a real demonstrator, to show what we can do.”
Exhibition
Exhibitors this year included the likes of Adhetec, BASF Corporation, Juki America, ZSK Stickmaschinen and Shanghai Hansi Industrial.
MEMA, the vehicle suppliers’ association, had a booth at the expo for the first time, representing more than 1,000 companies that supply original equipment (OE). “Shows like this are really good for us to not only touch base with our suppliers and see what’s new but also see what’s going on in the industry,” enthused Alison Trumble, MEMA’s director of membership – marketing.
Automotive Interiors Expo was co-located with Automotive Testing Expo, and Continental’s booth spanned both areas of interest. “We have three groups represented, one interior focused, two testing focused,” said Brett Castagnari, the company’s section manager for external business and customer management. “We wanted to be in both shows to showcase our proving grounds, tire R&D and winter proving ground, as well as our niche engineering services focusing on user interfaces and different components within a vehicle interior. Continental appeals to a wide audience that attends the show, so there is some overlap between the interiors and testing segments. The expo is always a great opportunity to meet existing and new customers. Making one legitimate connection with a prospective customer is often what it takes for us to have a successful show.”
Meanwhile, with changes to environmental regulations having an impact on the conventional plating of plastics, Taiyo Technology exhibited its latest trivalent chrome plating technology. “In the US, the Big Three (Ford, Stellantis and GM), together with EV manufacturers such as Rivian and Lucid Motors, are taking a very active approach toward the adoption of trivalent chrome for their new chrome colors,” revealed Azeem Hamaradeen, general manager at Taiyo Soft Singapore. “Automotive Interiors Expo North America is the perfect chance for us to educate on safer chrome plating processes and answer to the needs of the market for high-quality, environmentally friendly components.”
Innovation Showcase
The new Innovation Showcase featured short sessions on the expo floor highlighting concepts, prototypes and future trends from those at the forefront of the industry. Speakers from Sefar, Fujikura America, Supreme Group, Taiyo Manufacturing and Covestro, among others, spoke about accomplishing more with less, designing smarter, the evolution in decorative and structural parts with functional integration, and more.
One of the highlights was a new LuxSense synthetic leather presented by Dow. According to speaker Dr Binbin Luo, technical service and development scientist at Dow, “We are excited to promote LuxSense to the automotive value chain, and the Innovation Showcase highlights the latest and greatest in automotive interiors. This advanced silicone leather solution was meticulously engineered with performance and comfort in mind, and will allow industry professionals to discover the power of sensibly crafted luxury.”
North America’s leading automotive interior design, component and fabrication showcase will return once again to the Suburban Collection Showplace in Novi, Michigan, on October 21, 22 and 23, 2025. Click here to find out more.
