Volkswagen is a company that has rarely been one of the big trendsetters. In their history, the Wolfsburgers often let rivals try out a vehicle segment before they got in themselves, but then with power. In e-mobility, the car brand VW, which accounts for half of all cars sold in Wolfsburg's multi-brand empire, now wants to go full throttle. The ID.3 compact car is retreaded a few years after its market launch, and the ID.7 sedan is presented in China. In Chattanooga, production of the ID.4 SUV for the US market is set to pick up speed. In addition, plans for the entry-level segment are becoming more concrete.
Christian Müßgens
Business correspondent in Hamburg.
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In the Congress Center Hamburg, an event center between the Alster and the city park Planten un Blomen, brand boss Thomas Schäfer presented the study for a fully electric small car on Wednesday evening. It is called ID.2 All and is intended to be the first electric car in the Group to cost less than 25,000 euros. The terrain is difficult, because expensive electric drive technology with battery and Co. is difficult to install cost-covering in the lower price segment. But Tesla has already set its engineers on it, and VW is now getting serious.
The focus should be on the "people"
"We have mobilized masses, we have spread technology and democratized it," Schäfer told journalists on Wednesday. The aim is to put the "people" in the Volkswagen brand more strongly forward again and also to score points in e-mobility with cars at affordable prices.
Visually, the ID.2 All is more closely linked to models such as the Polo or the Golf instead of the previous design language of the ID series. VW wants to introduce a production version in 2025. On the market, the car will then come a year later, as one of ten new electric models that VW wants to bring out by then. The technical platform serves as the basis for four small models of different brands, including Skoda and the Seat brand Cupra.
It is to be built in Spain, where VW and its partners are investing 10 billion euros in the electrification of the sites. A battery factory is planned, for which the foundation stone will be laid on Friday – together with King Felipe and Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.
Price to fall further
In the medium term, VW wants to lower the price threshold even further. To this end, engineers in the Group are fine-tuning a car for less than 20,000 euros, a project in which the Czech volume brand Skoda is in charge. Thus, the Wolfsburg reached "the broadest portfolio compared to the competition," it was said on Wednesday. For the VW brand, the small cars are an important building block for achieving an electric share of 80 percent of vehicles sold in Europe by the end of the decade. Previously, 70 percent had been calculated.
How difficult it is to assert itself in the new drive world, VW is currently feeling in China. There, own vehicles are selling only slowly, while new rivals are gaining market share. The economic environment is also causing problems, which is reflected in the profit forecast for the current year, which VW also presented on Wednesday.
Instead of the six percent previously promised, the VW brand now expects an operating return on sales of "more than four percent" for 2023. The reasons are the insecure supply of parts, raw material and energy prices as well as political risks. Last year, despite fewer deliveries, the brand increased earnings by 22.5 percent to 2.6 billion euros, partly because VW pushed through higher prices due to tight supply. The margin climbed to 3.6 percent.