VW has announced a bold new ‘Zukunft Volkswagen’ - future Volkswagen - plan of attack, in a bid to make the passenger cars division of the business nothing less than ‘the technologically leading volume manufacturer globally by 2030.’ The strategy will include nine new models by 2027, ‘optimising cost structures’, and investment in an all-electric compact platform to underpin the Golf - securing the Wolfsburg factory’s role to build it.
You’ll probably be aware of the wrangling between VW and its factory workers at the end of last year over proposed closures, redundancies and pension cuts. The result of which is that current Golf production is moving to Mexico, freeing up Wolfsburg to be a flagship facility for future large selling EVs - the Golf and Tiguan. It is to ‘remain the centre for innovation and production competence’, which sounds like just the kind of phrase that there’s one long word for in German. CEO Thomas Scafer said: “With the results of the negotiations in December, we have embarked on the largest future plan in the history of Volkswagen. We are now following an ambitious course with a view to ensuring that we reach the targets we have jointly agreed. This will be a key step in making electromobility attractive for everyone – the clear goal of our brand.”
Which is where the car in the teaser image comes in; there’s been a lot of excitement around the ID. 2all since it was revealed as a concept, because it previewed a cool EV VW that just hasn’t existed thus far. The Buzz is a properly desirable thing; the rest of the IDs are not. VW reckons that the showroom spec ID. 2all will be less than €25k (£20,800), with an ‘entry-level electric car’ - which we think is the one in this image - coming in at about €20k (£16,600) the year after next. Just the thing to rival a new Twingo, perhaps. Daniela Cavallo, Chairperson of the General and Group Works Council of Volkswagen AG, said: “The new all-electric entry-level model will be a Volkswagen in the genuine sense of the term. It is therefore appropriate that our employees at the Wolfsburg plant will be the first to have a preview of the design – before the general public.”
Beyond this preview of the appearance and the confirmation that it will use an evolution of the MEB architecture, there’s nothing more to say about the little ID just yet. Instead it’s being used to represent part of a bigger plan, the ‘triple A’ of ‘accelerate, attack and achieve’ that VW will use going forward. Again a result of the negotiations with unions, the triple A approach aims to see VW catch up with rivals through more competitively priced, more desirable EVs.
Expect to hear more about the Scalable Systems Platform as a result of all that; it’s going to underpin the next T-Roc and ‘Golf successor’, of which more than 500,000 are currently made annually at Wolfsburg - and will continue to as EVs. It’ll be the “capital of our new all-electric compact class”, said Schäfer. SSP itself will be seen in passenger cars across the group, in much the same way the MEB is right now; VW suggests it is an ‘all-electric, fully digitalised, highly scalable mechatronics platform based on a uniform system architecture.’ Which it’s perhaps hard to get too revved up by, but VW at least knows by now where its first generation of ID cars fell short - SSP should represent a useful improvement. It has to, if those 2030 goals are to be met.
There isn’t a date or location yet announced for a reveal of the new ID concept, though as such an important small car for VW it’s surely set for centre stage wherever it debuts. Schäfer added: “An affordable, high-quality, profitable electric Volkswagen from Europe for Europe. This is the Champions League of automobile manufacturing.” Given the CL has been behind a paywall for a while (in the UK, at least) and is now played in a confusing format where the old way made more sense, perhaps not the greatest analogy. But the ambition isn’t in doubt. VW will be hoping its new show car hits the back of the net (sorry) next month.
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