Keep knowledgeable with free updates
Merely signal as much as the Cars myFT Digest — delivered on to your inbox.
Volkswagen’s historic restructuring shouldn’t be sufficient, the corporate’s chief monetary officer has warned, citing a “enormous threat [that] complacency kicks in once more” earlier than Europe’s largest carmaker can rework itself.
“We’re not finished but. The actual proof that we will carry out the programme and implement it 100 per cent nonetheless hasn’t come,” chief monetary officer Arno Antlitz informed the FT’s Way forward for the Automotive summit on Tuesday.
“There’s a enormous threat that after a programme like this delivers the primary outcomes, then complacency kicks in once more.”
In December, Volkswagen backtracked on plans to shut a number of German vegetation following fierce employee resistance, reaching an unprecedented deal to halve its manufacturing capability within the nation and minimize its workforce by 35,000 by 2030. Earlier this month, the corporate stated it had already shrunk its workforce by 7,000.
On the summit, Thomas Schäfer, chief govt of the corporate’s flagship VW model, echoed the warning, saying that the automobile firm was not the place it wished to be but. “There may be quite a lot of work to be finished,” he stated.
Volkswagen introduced the restructuring programme within the face of a expensive transition to electrical autos, structurally decrease gross sales in Europe and falling market share in China.
The corporate’s woes have sparked alarm in Germany and extra broadly throughout Europe, as they spotlight the challenges the continent faces with productiveness and power and labour prices in contrast with Chinese language carmakers, that are pushing to develop within the area.
Antlitz additionally known as on politicians in Brussels and Berlin to implement structural reforms to spice up productiveness and adaptability within the labour market, saying a failure to behave now would jeopardise the success of Germany’s latest investments in defence and infrastructure.
“We have to deal with not solely structural reforms, but additionally flexibility of labour market,” Antlitz stated. “If we don’t do this, we threat these investments we have to do, for instance in Germany, in defence and in infrastructure.”
The group’s quarterly gross sales of EVs in Europe have greater than doubled in the course of the first quarter, with each one in 5 automobiles bought in western Europe now totally electrical. Nevertheless, rising battery-run automobile gross sales additionally squeezed its working margins, which fell to three.7 per cent from 6 per cent in the identical interval final 12 months.
Schäfer stated the VW model was aiming to achieve price parity between electrical automobiles and petrol autos by 2030. “We’re not quick sufficient,” he stated.
Income have additionally come below stress from US President Donald Trump’s greater tariffs on imports of foreign-made automobiles. The group’s working margin is projected to fall to the decrease finish of its vary at 5.5 per cent resulting from rising commerce restrictions.
