Volkswagen recently announced plans to invest $193 billion to make every fifth car it sells electric by 2025. More than two-thirds of the money goes to software, battery factories and other investments.
At a Tuesday media event, the New York Times reports that Arno Antlitz, CFO of the Volkswagen Group, said the company needs to transform “into a technology and mobility services group”.
“We need to focus on our platforms,” Antlitz said, “like our battery electric vehicle hardware, unified software stack, batteries, mobility, autonomous driving.” He also said his company’s strong financial position would help it “continue to invest in electrification and digitization” despite the current “challenging economic environment”.
CNBC reported a 68% spike in China, prompting Volkswagen to move into EV expansion, aided by the completion of a historic manufacturing facility in Tennessee.
Deliveries for Volkswagen fell 7% overall in 2022, as current CEO Oliver Blume took over from Herbert Diess in September last year – who aggressively pushed the company to embrace electric cars. Blume told Tuesday’s press that 2023 would be a decisive year for Volkswagen.
Thanks to a rise in energy prices and COVID-19 disrupted supply chains beginning to self-correct, Volkswagen reported a net profit of $16.7 billion in 2022 – an increase of 2.6 percent over the previous year.
Volkswagen indicated on Tuesday that it would continue to invest in China and enter into partnerships with local companies there. In addition, the automaker plans to become a larger North American player. Such steps could help to catch up with leading US automakers such as General Motors, Ford, Toyota and Hyundai.
