The Volkswagen Group formally started series production of its ID.3 electric car this week, with the automaker aiming to become a world leader in the developing field of e-mobility.
A ceremony, held at Volkswagen’s Zwickau plant, was visited by CEO Herbert Diess and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, as well as others.
In a speech, excerpts of which were released online, Diess stated that ID.3 would “make an important contribution to the breakthrough of e-mobility.”
“It makes clean individual mobility accessible to millions of people and is a milestone for our firm on the road to becoming climate-neutral by 2050,” he included.
In a declaration on its website, Volkswagen referred its “electric offensive” as “picking up speed.” The ID.3 is set to be released “almost simultaneously” in European markets next summer, with the basic version marketed at below 30,000 euros ($33,487) in Germany.
The Zwickau facility is presently going through a conversion from being a 100% internal combustion engine factory to one that manufactures only electric vehicles. Volkswagen is putting about 1.2 billion euros into the site’s re-development and states that from 2021 it will have the ability to produce 330,000 all-electric vehicles yearly.
Volkswagen is preparing to launch “nearly 70 new electric models” by 2028. In March, it stated it would spend more than 30 billion euros on the electrification of its auto portfolio by 2023.
