![]() Internally, I said to my team, “VW has to become a love brand again! A friendly brand that people like. And that’s exactly what we want to build on again. To us, our heritage is not a burden but a real asset. “People have smiles on their faces and pull out their smartphones when they see a Volkswagen Beetle, Microbus or Golf GTI. Schäfer is bullish on the Volkswagen brand. Volkswagen, Seat, Cupra, Skoda and Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles - we’re leveraging the huge potential of the brand group volume to give us a competitive edge,” he added, in what might be interpreted at a not so subtle dig at former Group CEO Herbert Diess. “Admittedly, in the past, this was more a snare than an impetus. Its goal overall is to ensure 20% efficiency gains in synergy, 8% return on investment across its volume brands, and for those brands to account for 80% of entire volume of the Volkswagen Group. By applying a principle of “develop once, implement worldwide,” the company will save €220 million this year. He told Autocar his motto is “best brand, best team, best results.” Shäfer said the brands were clearly positioned and differentiated to address different customers, while there was a “lean engine room working behind the scenes on synergies and efficiencies.”Īcross its 23 production plants, the company is now shifting its focus from individual models at each factory towards grouping by platforms. His interview with Autocar comes on the 100th day after he stepped into his new role as Volkswagen Brand CEO, following the elevation of former Porsche chief executive Oliver Blume to his new position as head of Volkswagen Group. “In each segment we compete in, we want to live up to our Leading Volume motto: do less but get it right,” Shäfer said. Schäfer said that Volkswagen is “shedding old habits” in terms of its product lineup to focus on core models and will “noticeably simplify our model range and packages over the next ten years.” That means some well-known conventional models will disappear and there will be significantly fewer options for customers to choose from. ![]() “From the entry-level e-car with a target price of under €25,000 to the Volkswagen ID Buzz and the new flagship Volkswagen ID Aero, we will have the right offer in every segment,” he said, and then added the MEB platform continues to make “significant advances, for example in terms of range, performance and helpful features.” The MEB platform will disappear later this decade, to be replaced by a new architecture called SSP - which stands for scalable systems platform - on which all large volume Volkswagen Group models will be based. Schäfer claimed when the new models are all on sale, Volkswagen will have the broadest portfolio of electric cars in the automotive industry. These new cars will be among ten new electric cars to be launched by 2026, including updates to some existing models. He described the upcoming duo as “a small car and a sporty crossover variant.” They will be similar in size to the current Volkswagen Polo and Volkswagen T-Cross, both of which rely on a tried and true Verbrennungsmotor. Schäfer also said Volkswagen will introduce two versions of its highly anticipated entry level electric car, which will start at around £20,000. One of the key features of the MEB platform is that it is able to be made longer or shorter, wider or narrower, to suit a variety of models. The ID.4 is currently the German brand’s smallest electric SUV, sharing the MEB platform with the ID.3, but with a significantly bigger footprint than its hatchback counterpart. In his remarks, he said the new model would look dramatically different than the ID.3 when it arrives sometime before 2026 rather than being a “Russian doll” approach to styling. ![]() ![]() In an interview with Autocar, Volkswagen Brand CEO Thomas Schäfer said a crossover version of the popular ID.3 hatchback is on the way as the company looks to capitalize on the exploding small SUV market.
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