Automotive Lightweighting Strategy

The executive track — where mass matters, which materials win where, and how to build and defend a vehicle lightweighting roadmap.

Private cohorts & on-site
Format: 2-day (8:30 a.m.–4:30 p.m.)
Level: Intermediate
Location: Scheduled on demand · on-site at your facility or a regional venue
Date(s): Not yet scheduled for open enrollment. Get notified when it is, or book it privately for your team.
Includes: Certificate of Completion · printed slide binder · take-home reference text

Get notified when this course is scheduled

One email when dates are set. Or skip the wait: run it as a private cohort, on-site at your plant.

Talk to us about a private cohort
  • One email, no sequence
  • Never shared
  • Reply within one business day

Faculty

Faculty details for this seminar will be announced with the full schedule.

Fees

Early: $1,895 (payment 4+ weeks ahead)
Standard: $2,095 (check/ACH) · $2,165 (card)

Group discount: $200 off per attendee for 3+ from the same organization.

Also Available

  • Corporate on-site delivery at your facility
  • Private cohort sessions
  • Digital curriculum licensing

Seminar Overview

Lightweighting is decided at the vehicle-architecture level — and engineers who can speak that language win programs. Taught by executives who directed materials strategy at Ford and DaimlerChrysler, this is the executive track on automotive lightweighting: where mass matters, which materials win where, how to build a materials roadmap, and how to integrate lightweighting with cost, manufacturing, and regulatory demands. It is the strategic complement to ETS's design- and materials-level courses.

Ideal Learner

  • OEM and Tier-1 engineering managers and program architects
  • Materials and advanced-development directors
  • Product engineers leading lightweighting programs
  • Technical leaders commissioning new materials roadmaps
  • Executives approving lightweighting investment

Learning Objectives

  • Quantify where vehicle mass matters and the lightweighting levers per subsystem
  • Compare plastics, composites, aluminum, and advanced steel on system weight and cost
  • Build and defend an automotive materials roadmap
  • Integrate lightweighting with manufacturing, durability, and compliance
  • Staff and sequence a lightweighting program to measurable results

Consulting Sessions

Seminar attendees can sign up for individual consulting sessions with the instructor. Sessions are free for registered attendees, first-come first-served — sign up when registering by calling 248-539-0473 or during the seminar.

Seminar Outline

  • Mass decomposition and the lightweighting levers
  • The physics: why weight reduction compounds across systems
  • Benchmarking and gap analysis
  • Plastics vs. composites vs. aluminum vs. steel by application
  • BiW, closures, interiors, underhood, battery enclosures
  • Cost, manufacturing, and supply realities
  • SMC, GMT, thermoplastic composites, organosheets
  • Part integration and consolidation for mass + cost
  • Real program case studies and lessons
  • Battery enclosures and thermal management plastics
  • Pack mass and efficiency trade-offs
  • The NEW heavyweight battle: EV weight discipline
  • Roadmap methodology and technology timing
  • Capability, supplier, and capital planning
  • Communicating the case to leadership
  • Attendees develop a lightweighting roadmap for a defined vehicle program
  • Defend it against cost and manufacturing reality
  • Present to a mock executive review

More in Track B — Composites & Lightweighting

Full Course Catalog