In the fight for the top spot in the German electric car market Tesla in the first half of the year again ahead by a nose, but the lead over top dog Volkswagen melts. According to figures from the Federal Motor Transport Authority, 36,400 Teslas and 34,400 pure VW brand electric vehicles were newly registered from January to June.
Tesla had snatched the German electric car crown from VW in the second half of 2022. Now defending the company from Elon Musk (52) the top spot. However, the lead shrank from 7400 to 2000 cars. The market shares of the brands were 16.5 and 15.6 percent of the total of 220,200 in Germany newly registered electric cars.
There is a clear gap behind the two leaders. Mercedes follow with 16,900, Audi with 14,400 as well bmw with 12,800 electric cars in the first half of the year and market shares between 7.7 and 5.8 percent.
VW further ahead at group level
At least at group level, VW does not have to worry about its leading position in the German electric car market for the foreseeable future. If you count the new registrations of the other group brands – 14,400 at Audi, 7800 at Skoda, 5900 at Seat and 2700 at Porsche – in the first half of the year, the Wolfsburg-based company has almost twice as many pure electric vehicles as Tesla and a market share of almost 30 percent.
But there is also potential for concern: Compared to the market share that VW achieves across all drive types, there is a gap of almost 10 percentage points.
Pressure comes out too China. The According to the management consultancy AlixPartners, Chinese car manufacturers will be world export champions for the first time this year. Already in the first quarter the country exported 1.07 million cars Japan overtaken by 954,000 cars, followed by Germany (840,000), South Korea (750,000) and Mexico (741,000). As a production location, sales market and exporter, the People’s Republic is “well on the way to becoming an automotive superpower,” said Alix industry expert Fabian Piontek.
“The era of record profits by German automobile manufacturers will come to an end,” write the industry experts. In a cooling world market with increasing competition, the pressure on profit margins is increasing. Battery costs, which were falling too slowly, dampened the faster increase in sales of electric cars over the next three to five years. This prevents cost advantages through large quantities.