Volkswagen has unveiled a new short-term strategy titled Accelerate Forward, which aims to raise the company’s profitability to a solid 6.5% in three years. In absolute monetary terms, this means €10 million of extra income per year. To achieve this, the concern will be trimming down its model lineup, most likely starting with the Arteon.
The executives believe that prioritizing mass-market cars with the biggest sales margins is a viable profit raising strategy. This inevitably means that the German automaker will be reducing the number of less-popular vehicles in its portfolio to free up the assembly lines for the more popular ones. The VW Arteon is the only model that’s officially on its way out so far, with the ID.7 EV seen as the likely replacement.
That said, many cars still in production may lose certain less-demanded trim levels. There are no specifics yet, but Volkswagen points out that the new ID.7 has 99% fewer design variations than the Golf Mk7. Eliminating the excess variations may both simplify production and raise profits, the company argues.
Further methods of raising profitability include optimizing the ways in which the industrial capacities are used and continuing to unify cars across the various VW Group brands.