Seat has plans to open a software development center in Barcelona, Spain. Badged Seat:CODE (Centre of Digital Excellence), work there will boost two major areas within Seat and the Volkswagen Group – the company’s digital transformation and increasing efficiency through process digitization. It will also strengthen business models for new concepts of vehicle mobility, connectivity and digitization within Seat.
Seat president, Luca de Meo, said, “If we want to transform from a car producer into a mobility company, and we want to engage in so-called Industry 4.0, we have to make software a core competence.”
The facility will be headed up by new CTO Carlos Buenosvinos. Buenosvinos, 36, has a degree in Advanced IT Engineering from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC) and has spent his career working in the tech sector. Until last April he was the vice president for technology at Xing, a position he held for three years. He has also been CTO of Atrápalo and Emagister.
Meanwhile,Seat has also implemented a new IT structure company-wide, led by Sebastian Grams as Seat’s new CIO.Grams commented, “TheSeat:CODE confirms the company’s commitment to becoming a benchmark of vehicle digitization and of developing new mobility solutions. Moreover, this new center will enable us to enhance synergies within the company with other teams, such as XMoba, which are dedicated to developing and implementing new mobility concepts.”
Grams, 39, has two degrees in Industrial Engineering and a PhD from the University of Karlsruhe. He has developed his career in the Volkswagen Group working at Audi, where he has held various positions in IT and technical development. Since January 2019 he has also been a part of the Metropolis:Lab management team.
The team at the Metropolis:Lab will be integrated into the new center. They will work in collaboration with the newSeat:CODE team to develop mobility solutions and harness potential synergies.
More than 100 software development specialists will be based at the Seat:CODE. Interested applicants can apply here.