Question: As ZF Aftermarket transforms itself to meet market demands, what is the company’s vision for the future of the global aftermarket?
Philippe Colpron: At ZF we are No. 1 in brakes, steering and suspensions of light and heavy commercial vehicles, as well as in powertrain components, such as clutch and transmissions. I’m very happy to lead that business across commercial vehicles and industrial applications, as well as passenger cars.
In recent years, the industry has faced uncertainty around the pace of technological change and the growing importance of sustainability. Despite this, I’ve always been confident in the long‑term importance of the aftermarket.
Mobility has become a fundamental expectation of modern life, whether it’s people travelling freely or essential goods arriving at our doors. This demand isn’t slowing down; it is evolving and expanding.
To keep society moving efficiently, vehicles must remain reliable, safe, and continuously operational. That’s where the aftermarket plays an indispensable role. As mobility grows more complex, maintaining Uptime and performance becomes even more critical.
Our vision at ZF Aftermarket reflects this reality. We aim to stand alongside our customers as partners, helping them maximize vehicle Uptime, improve efficiency, and meet the rising expectations placed on modern mobility. Ultimately, our mission is to ensure that mobility remains dependable, sustainable, and always available when the world needs it.
Q: Why is Uptime a more important matter now in the industry than it has ever been?
PC: Uptime has become one of the most critical topics in our industry today. The main reason is that every push for greater efficiency adds a new layer of complexity. Vehicles, operations, and supply chains are more advanced than ever, and that means the cost of downtime, whether for fleets, workshops, or distributors, has never been higher.
Each customer segment is also undergoing its own transformation. Parts distributors are digitizing their operations, workshops are adapting to new technologies and skills requirements, and fleets are evolving their business models and ownership structures. All these shifts create a more competitive market where everyone is striving to differentiate themselves.
To support our customers effectively in this environment, we must improve our capabilities. That means embracing new technologies, advancing digitalization, and adapting to the new expectations of the market while staying close to our customers. Ensuring Uptime isn’t just a service goal anymore; it’s a strategic necessity for the entire mobility ecosystem
Q: What does “Mobility Uptime” mean for ZF and what is your approach towards it?
PC: For ZF, Mobility Uptime means keeping every vehicle — of any age, technology, or drivetrain — safe, productive, and operational throughout its lifecycle. The industry is in a transition where traditional and future technologies coexist, and our customers must succeed in both.
ZF’s strength is our ability to support conventional systems while also delivering the innovations needed for new mobility. We help customers make this shift in a way that remains operationally and financially sustainable.
For distributors, that means using data and intelligence to turn inventory faster. For workshops, it means providing the training, tools, and digital capabilities required to service increasingly software‑defined vehicles. As more fleets rely on automated decision‑making, we connect workshops, distributors, and operators into an integrated ecosystem.
Ultimately, Mobility Uptime is about ensuring customers stay profitable, prepared, and fully operational, both today and in the future
Q: What are the major pain points of your customers today that become the biggest causes for downtime? And what is ZF doing to address these pain points?
PC: Today, downtime often stems from not having fast, accurate information on what has failed, which part is needed, and how to repair it. That’s why we’re heavily investing in digitalization, to quickly identify failure modes, recommend the right parts, and get that insight to the right person.
For workshops, our focus is advanced multi‑brand diagnostics. By applying deeper troubleshooting capabilities and AI‑driven analysis, we help technicians diagnose issues faster and with more precision, reducing unnecessary downtime.
For distributors, the main challenge is stocking the right parts. We support them with data and intelligence to build the optimal range and ensure consistent availability. Quality is critical — poor‑quality parts create more downtime — so strong product information and reliable brands are central.
Once vehicles are on the road, we aim to keep them there. Our telematics and remote‑diagnostic solutions enable predictive and preventive maintenance, feeding real‑time health data into fleet planning systems so issues are addressed before they lead to breakdowns.
Overall, we tackle downtime at every stage: diagnosis, parts availability, and in‑operation monitoring — ensuring our customers run more reliably and efficiently
Q: In certain regions, such as the Middle East, fleets still operate in reactive maintenance cycles. What is ZF doing here to help accelerate digital adoption?
PC: The Middle East and the wider IMEA region are very diverse. You have highly developed urban areas with modern vehicle fleets, but also regions that are still developing. Because of this, it’s difficult to describe the entire market with one definition.
One of ZF Aftermarket’s strengths is the breadth and depth of our solutions across different vehicle types, ages, and origins. This allows us to support all parts of the region, regardless of where they are in their digital journey.
We already have strong examples in markets like Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and India, which were early adopters of our advanced telematics solutions. These fleets had very specific use cases and were able to calculate their total cost of ownership and payback clearly.
In Turkey, for example, the reliability of city buses is critical in dense urban environments. In the region’s cold chain, maintaining the quality and reliability of refrigerated transport is essential.
So, there are multiple relevant use cases, and we have both the technical solutions and the flexibility to adapt them to local requirements. Equally important are partnerships with the right local entrepreneurs to help ensure we implement these solutions successfully together
Q: What do you imagine the service ecosystem of the future will look like?
PC: To focus only on future solutions ignores the realities customers manage today, while focusing only on the present overlooks the clear transformation underway. The service ecosystem of the future must balance both, and ZF is well positioned because of the breadth of our portfolio.
Core systems such as chassis, braking, suspension, and steering will remain essential regardless of powertrain, so we continue to invest heavily in them. At the same time, vehicles are becoming increasingly software‑driven, which makes our expertise in advanced diagnostics more important than ever.
Our transmission business shows this duality well: combustion‑engine transmissions require a strong global remanufacturing footprint, while electrified systems demand different technologies but similar deep technical and software capabilities.
Ultimately, the future service ecosystem will be shaped by what happens in the workshop. If mechanics spend most of their time navigating multiple screens and loading codes instead of repairing vehicles, efficiency and capacity suffer. Every minute matters.
By understanding the full journey of both the mechanic and the vehicle, enabling more remote work and integrating tools into a single interface — we can deliver true efficiency, higher productivity, and sustainable business performance.
Q: How important are partnerships with telematics providers, fleet management systems, and OEMs?
PC: Partnerships are essential, but sometimes you need to take the lead to make them happen. This is why ZF decided to develop its own telematics and fleet‑management solutions and build on our strong diagnostics capabilities.
At the same time, in order to be more relevant you need to onboard more partners. It’s important for us to reach out to existing and potential partners — and we welcome them to reach out to us as well. Our value proposition becomes stronger with complementary services such as tires, fuel‑card payments, and other non‑competing vehicle technologies. We have those associations when it comes to, for example, workshop loyalty programmes that include batteries, as they’re complementary to our value offering.
So partnerships are key in the field of technology and software, and we use our role as OEM to be able to have that exchange. In the aftermarket field, we need to bring something which is compelling for the workshops that leverages the ability to minimise the pain point of our customers through collaboration.
