The winged arrow: the company logo on the roof of the Škoda works in Pilsen. The Czech car manufacturer has belonged to the VW Group since 1991.
Image: Imago
Without battery production, the Czech Republic as a car manufacturing location could lose touch with electromobility. The government in Prague wants to prevent that. But not everyone likes the plan.
Everything is new at the Czech carmaker Škoda: design language, logo, brand identity, even CEO Klaus Zellmer, who recently presented himself and everything else to a few hundred guests in Prague. Last but not least, the “Vision 7S” concept study for a new, beefy SUV. Fully electric, of course. And everything is on the same wavelength as the new Volkswagen CEO Oliver Blume, who wants to increase the pace on the way to e-mobility. Škoda, a subsidiary of the VW Group for 31 years, is aiming for seven out of ten cars sold in the model series to be fully electric by 2030.
Andreas Mihm
Business correspondent for Austria, Central and Eastern Europe and Turkey based in Vienna.
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So it is fitting that the government in Prague decided on a concept at the end of July, according to which the batteries for cars could also be produced in the Czech Republic in the future. Industry and Trade Minister Jozef Síkela knows what is at stake: the country’s automotive sector generates about 10 percent of gross domestic product and accounts for 20 percent of exports. No company in the Czech Republic is larger than the car manufacturer from Jungbunzlau (Mladá Boleslav), northeast of Prague.