Seats: innovation, safety and diversity
The seat is a key vehicle differentiator and plays a vital role
in passenger protection. Faurecia designs and assembles
seats and manufactures their main components.
Five percent of sales are invested in research into safer,
more comfortable and more attractive seats that weigh less
and cost less.
Faurecia has the capacity to integrate more than
two-thirds of the value of the complete seat in its own
plants. It owes its position as Europe's leading seat
manufacturer, and one of the top three worldwide, to
the wealth and breadth of its offer. Faurecia puts this
savoir-faire to work for its customers, providing end
users with increasingly personalized, comfortable and
safe interiors at the right price.
Innovating for safety
One of Faurecia's major research priorities is the safety of motorists. Its research center in Brières, France,
employs 150 people to come up with ways to make
car travel safer. This center is responsible for safety
systems known as the Faurecia Care Systems. The Lower Limbs & Lumbar Care System, for example,
is an active anti-submarining mechanism which prevents
the occupant from sliding under the seatbelt in the event
of impact. Faurecia is also developing seat frames that
can absorb severe impacts. All new products are tested
in the Seating test centers, equipped with powerful
simulation, calculation and virtual development tools.
Vehicles are subjected to virtual crashes in order to test
airbag deployment and the resistance of seats to the
impact of luggage in the rear of the vehicle.
Made to measure
In close collaboration with our Brières facility, six
development centers in France, Germany, and the
United States operate in proximity to automakers'
design studios on the definition and approval of seats
for new vehicles. Faurecia offers a vast range
of retractable, adjustable, and foldable rear seats that
enhance vehicle differentiation. To improve comfort,
Faurecia's high-performance foam offers either
enhanced performance for a given volume or reduced
volume for given performance criteria. Slimline seats
help to optimize the vehicle's interior space.
Standardizing and reducing costs
In addition to finding ways to create lightweight seats,
R&D also looks for innovations leading to costreduction.
Faurecia develops generic products and
standard manufacturing processes that help
automakers offer a wider range of seats while at the
same time cutting costs. Faurecia's flexible architecture
allows it to equip different vehicles on a same platform,
as well as vehicles on different platforms.
 more about the seat
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