According to BI sources Herbert Diess and Brand CEO Ralf Brandstätter called Thursday all 120 top managers in Wolfsburg together for a crisis meeting
Diess stated that compared to Tesla and Chinese manufacturers VW is too expensive, slow and with low productivity not competitive
Now it is a matter of taking up the "fight against Grünheide" Diess said according to BI sources
If everything remains as it is, Diess insists, VW will no longer be competitive
Diess "We have a great responsibility for this site. We have to embrace the new competition."
CEO Brandstätter stated
'It is urgently necessary that a new course is set in Wolfsburg. Future competition with Tesla's new Gigafactory will be brutal. The electric car pioneer sets new standards in car production (...)'
Brandstätter continued
'For example, a Model 3 is built in 10 hours, more than 3 times as fast as a VW ID.3 in Zwickau. This puts Tesla in another dimension in terms of productivity and profitability'
Herbert Diess made clear,
"We need a will to live and a jolt at the site".
"Trinity has to take the site to a new competitive level, has to revolutionize it. Also with new processes."
However, the board says the designs for the project so far don't go far enough.
Diess: "In the end, it's also about the jobs we have here. Mr. Diess or the Supervisory Board or the employee representatives don't decide about the jobs. It is the customer who decides, and the customer buys the product that offers more quality, more features for a better price"
The VW Group CEO concluded
"That's why we have to take up the fight, attack and not let Grünheide ruin our location"
This is a really alarming and crisis atmosphere at VW HQ and the tone the CEOs used sounds very different from Herbert Diess' tweet today
"In the future, the combustion engine will no longer play a major role in brand communication. We have to convince people that electromobility is the right way to go."
How about changing the company instead of the communication?
When asked about the Audi Motto "Vorsprung durch Technik" (ahead through technology)
Wortmann replied "We have thought about if we want to keep it"
The Audi Marketing head continued
"But the claim is 50 years old, historically charged. Now we're adapting that in marketing. It used to be about higher, faster, further. Today it's about sustainability and contributing to society. Technology is about solving problems."
BMW plans to offer a Remote Software Upgrade (RSU) for the iX next March, which will add Maneuver Assistant to the iX, allowing it to self-retrace a route of up to 200 meters previously recorded by the driver
200 meters? 🤨
The assistant is intended for the last few meters into or out of tight parking spaces or on the lot
BMW also wants to offer the so-called "Functions on Demand" for the first time, i.e. to enable HW already installed in the vehicle for subsequently offered SW functions. In the iX, these include active cruise control with stop-and-go function & steering and lane departure warning
Special thanks to @FullyChargedDan and for publishing a critical article that some other media outlets I offered it to didn't want to publish.
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An ID 3 caught fire on Saturday in Groningen NL. The driver took the charging plug out of the car and it started smoking. She quickly got her child out of the car & got herself to safety but the flames spread quickly
Note that EVs burn less often than ICE
Even though we haven't learned why the e-tron GT burned down while charging in Munich lately or the Taycan burned down while charging in the US, I find it somehow suspicious that VW Group vehicles seem to prefer to burn when plugged into a charger 😕
VW Speaker "We cannot make a statement on the cause of this fire until we have thoroughly investigated the vehicle and the circumstances"
We never learned why the Taycan burned in the USA or the e-tron in Munich.
Why should we learn why the ID.3 burned in the Netherlands? 🙄
"Tesla has not made any money for over 15 years except with certificate trading"
To be fair Diess, understands the CO2 certificate trading correctly as a measure to shift money to the ones who can reduce CO2 most effectively
But instead of answering why VW bought them from Tesla, he argues Tesla needed it to overcome a not competitive situation
While Diess repeated in the talk show the wrong narrative Tesla not have been profitable for 15 years without certificates he also said Tesla is today highly profitable
He added that the work done so far shows "that we can significantly mitigate one or two problems by working hard and save many cars with flexibility in production"
Diess continued
"I expect we'll be able to catch up in the 4th quarter"
Diess concluded
"We are indeed having a hard time getting delivery commitments for 2023/2024 for our needs."
Semiconductor challenges remain for future years - a competitive advantage for Tesla
Diess
"But of course we have a strong overall raw material price increase that goes through steel to many of our primary materials. And it probably won't be possible to absorb all of that."