Abstract
Keywords: Hybrid, diesel, gasoline, market penetration, forecast, customer acceptance.
Abstract: This paper gives a brief qualitative and quantitative overview of the current and future state of production, market penetration and customer acceptance of hybrid vehicles in the main automobile production areas worldwide (NAFTA, Europe, Japan, China and India).
Additionally, it will be discussed which effect the development and widespread distribution of hybrid vehicles will have on current and future technical developments of existing powertrain applications. It will also be discussed, whether the hybrid "phenomenon" is only a temporary North-American and Japanese issue, or if it will have a more widespread impact on other regions as well. This is particularly interesting since Europe is leading the way in diesel technology and hasn't "warmed up" to the idea of hybrids yet, while other regions, such as China or India for example, struggle to find customers for this technology due to higher production costs and therefore higher purchase prices for end users.