2024-04-07 10:38:03
in short:
- Volkswagen sales in China are on the decline
- The CEO admits: a 10% market share would be respectable
- Basic trams will try to help in the future
Lowers expectations: Volkswagen is trying to avoid setting “utopian” goals for its market share in China. In an interview with the German newspaper FAZ last Friday, the company’s CEO Oliver Bloom said that any figure higher than 10% would be “very respectable” given the intense competition.
“At the moment we will not be able to stand at the top of the table in the field of electric vehicles in China,” said CEO Oliver Bloom, but added that “new models that will be introduced in the coming years will improve our position.” By this he is mainly targeting new small electric models, some of which will be assembled in China in order to reduce costs with the goal market them at a competitive price in the local market.
Let’s recall that Volkswagen is one of the oldest western manufacturers in the Chinese market, which it entered as early as 1985, and it also has collaborations with Chinese industrial giants such as SAIC and FAW, which produce the concern’s models for it. But China’s rapid transition to electric drive caught Volkswagen, as well as other Western manufacturers, off guard. From a market share of 18% in 2018 in the Chinese market which is considered one of the largest for it, it found itself at the end of 2023 with a market share of only 14%. And if that wasn’t enough, then in the 2023 sales summary it became clear that Volkswagen is no longer the best-selling brand in China – for the first time in 15 years – after BYD overtook it.
What we think: Volkswagen is still the best-selling Western manufacturer in China and also leads the table as an automobile concern when the sales of all its brands (Volkswagen, Audi, Skoda and Porsche) are combined. In order to maintain its position, it must speed up the development of electric drive even for cheaper and more accessible base models.
Volkswagen is trying to find solutions that will strengthen its position, with the last step in the matter taking place last summer with the purchase of 5% of Xpeng with the aim of producing dull models based on the old MEB platform, models intended for marketing only in China. However, in light of the number of Chinese manufacturers that preceded it in introducing advanced electric drive systems in core models, such as BYD and Geely, which are also equipped with deep pockets, it seems that Volkswagen is facing an impossible task.
0 comments were published for this article
#Car #news #Volkswagen #admits