Production of the ID.3 at the VW plant in Zwickau
The car is now also being manufactured in China and will go on sale there in the fourth quarter.
(Photo: imago images / Eibner)
Düsseldorf Volkswagen is launching its third fully battery-powered electric model on the Chinese market. As the automaker announced on Sunday, VW will start selling its ID.3 in China in the fourth quarter. So far, the group has only offered this compact model in Europe.
Because the sales start was slow, the market leader VW has come under pressure with its e-models in China. The Wolfsburg-based company now has to prove that they can not only score points there with gasoline engines, but also with electric cars. The number of e-deliveries has risen in the past three months from 1,500 units in May to 3,000 in June to 5,800 in July.
VW plans to sell 80,000 to 100,000 cars from the electric ID family to Chinese customers by the end of the year. The chip supply should not deteriorate further, but Volkswagen made it a condition. “We are making it clear that we are striving for a leading market position in electric vehicles in China as well as Europe,” said Ralf Brandstätter, CEO of the Volkswagen Passenger Cars brand.
VW China boss Stephan Wöllenstein added: “With the ID.4 and the ID.6, we have successfully launched two strong model series on the market in the past few months. The feedback from our customers is promising, the delivery figures meet our expectations. ”With the ID.3 as an additional offer, Volkswagen is now introducing an important compact model in Golf format.
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The ID.4 is a mid-range SUV. The ID.6 – also an SUV – is slightly larger and is only sold in China.
Important influence from China
Volkswagen was criticized especially in stock exchange and financial circles for the slow start to sales of electric cars. The Wolfsburg-based company sells a good 40 percent of all its cars in China alone. The Chinese joint ventures transfer more than three billion euros in dividends to Wolfsburg every year. These revenue streams have become indispensable for the VW Group, and the Wolfsburg-based company is also using them to finance their transformations with electromobility and digitalization.
Volkswagen will not be able to do without the high income from China in the future either. “That’s why the electric car business has to work,” said a Wolfsburg company insider. As in Europe, there is also a gradual change towards electromobility in the People’s Republic. E-cars will catch on more quickly, especially in the megacities of Beijing and Shanghai.
Volkswagen’s initially very low e-sales figures were received on the stock exchange as a warning signal. New e-car providers such as Nio or Tesla apparently met with greater customer acceptance than a classic provider such as Volkswagen, was the concern among investors. The digital equipment of the VW models leaves a lot to be desired.
Volkswagen now wants to focus more on the electrical customers in China. To this end, the sales network is being expanded significantly once again. VW currently has around 2000 dealer bases in the People’s Republic. 150 new stations exclusively for e-models are now to be added. Volkswagen wants to take care of the more demanding e-customers there.
The Volkswagen brand is accelerating the ramp-up of the electric offensive worldwide. By 2030, at least 70 percent of all Volkswagen sales in Europe are to be purely e-cars, and around 80 percent are expected for Germany. In North America and China, the proportion of electric cars should be at least 50 percent.
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