Volkswagen needs to modify to stay relevant in the electric and digital vehicle era and will announce “important steps” to that end before the end of the year, CEO Herbert Diess said on Wednesday.
“Volkswagen needs to change: From a collection of valuable brands and fascinating combustion-engine products that thrill customers with superb engineering – to a digital company that reliably operates millions of mobility devices worldwide,” Diess informed shareholders at the company’s virtual general meeting.
Vehicles need to stay in touch with customers, provide new services and comfort functions on a weekly or even daily basis, Diess said.
“We will take further important steps to set the course for this in the rest of 2020,” he said.
Senior executives informed Reuters the automaker is reviewing what role its high-performance brands such as Lamborghini, Bugatti, and Ducati will play as the company increasingly focuses on electric, digital, and self-driving vehicles.
Volkswagen is looking at whether it has the ability to accelerate development of electric platforms for smaller brands at a time it is spending billions to transform its more mainstream cars.
Asked whether Ducati has an electric future, Markus Duesmann, who oversees research and development for the company, said that it will not take long until there would be an electric Ducati.
Whether Ducati, which is a medium-sized premium motorbike brand, would provide an electric variant, depends on whether a bike could come up with a range comparable to a combustion-engined variant, Duesmann said. He said that advances are being made in battery technology which could bring it into reality.
Separately Frank Witter, the company’s chief financial officer, in response to a question about whether a sale of Lamborghini is planned, said the automaker does not comment on speculation regarding potential divestments.
Lamborghini’s Chief Executive Stefano Domenicali this week announced his departure from the company to take on a new job as president of Formula One.
