Just-in-time auto industry news and analysis
If you went to Volkswagen’s much publicized press conference “on the current status of the clarification process concerning the diesel issue and on the realignment of the Group” (am copy pasting and not making it up) and if you hoped to come home with huge revelations, you left disappointed. There were a few juicy tidbits however. [ There is more … ]
Neusser, when Strategie 2018 was still achievable
The Hallway Radio was right, one more time. As intimated yesterday, Heinz-Jakob Neusser is no longer R&D chief at the Volkswagen brand. However, the Hallway Radio missed another big one: Long-term Purchasing chief Francisco Javier Garcia Sanz. [ There is more … ]
This morning, Germany’s usually well-informed Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung had a gem of a headline: “CO2 manipulation at VW vanishes into thin air.” According to the report, it was largely a false alarm. A few hours later, Volkswagen issued a statement, saying that the CO2 issue is “largely concluded.” [ There is more … ]
Bernstein Research is one of the few analysts that truly know the car industry. They don’t just dissect balance sheets, they take whole cars apart to find competitive (dis)advantages. Bernstein thinks that the G3, Volkswagen, BMW, and Daimler, are about to roll over Tesla, and that supposedly quick-footed Tesla is too slow to do anything about it. [ There is more … ]
DIY decapitation
Volkswagen famously needs twice the people as Toyota to make 10 million cars a year. Volkswagen has begun culling its ranks in an unorthodox way: At the top. Tomorrow, Wednesday, Volkswagen’s Supervisory Board will convene, and a day later, CEO Matthias Müller and Supervisory Board Chairman Hans Dieter Pötsch will meet the press to give a dieselgate update. Any management board level changes need approval by the supervisors, so Thursday is the day when new decapitations, some expected, some not, may be announced. [ There is more … ]
