Corvinus University of Budapest cordially invites all those interested to the public defence of the thesis proposal of PhD candidate Tamás Kovács. The title of his work is: Co-evolutionary Innovation and Business Model Transformation in the Electric Vehicle Transition. 

Date: 17 September 2026, Thursday 17:20—18:50 

Venue: Corvinus University of Budapest, Building C, Room C.5.510 

Language: English 

The dissertation examines how institutions and firms shape one another during sustainable technology transitions. Taking the electric vehicle transition as its empirical case, it asks which institutional, organisational and societal factors help overcome the path dependence and lock-in associated with established technologies. 

The research follows this process across three levels – firms, sectors and institutions – tracing how regulatory and societal expectations are converted into firm strategies and, ultimately, into market outcomes. The findings suggest that the drivers of innovation change over the course of a transition: regulation and public policy support dominate the early phases, while market mechanisms and business model effectiveness become increasingly decisive as the technology matures. On this basis the dissertation builds a more general co-evolutionary innovation framework applicable beyond the automotive sector. 

Supervisors: Szabolcs Szilárd Sebrek, Betsabé Pérez Garrido 

Chair of the committee: Asefeh Asemi 

Opponents: Ariel Zoltán Mitev, Dirk-Jan Kamann 

Secretary: Noémi Lőrincz