Penny for the thoughts of Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares when the bombshell news broke of the Volkswagen Group’s decision to close factories in Germany for the first time.
The seismic VW restructure is the result of slowing demand for electric vehicles, coupled with a spiralling cost base. In its development of electric vehicles, VW has chosen to create dedicated architectures and models, selling them alongside existing combustion-engine model lines, something that requires development and investment in two parallel technologies.
Stellantis has taken the opposite approach of ‘multi-energy’ architectures that can house multiple powertrain options, with the advantage of being able to scale according to demand.