Overview
- Senior management has presented options to the supervisory board that include doubling planned cuts to as many as 100,000 jobs and winding down production at four German sites.
- The four factories reported as under review are Hanover, Zwickau, Emden and Audi’s Neckarsulm, together employing more than 45,000 people and adding to 50,000 cuts already planned.
- Executives are also weighing a carve-out of the passenger-car and components businesses and a roughly 15% reduction in five-year capital spending to sharpen focus and cut costs.
- Works council members, IG Metall and Lower Saxony politicians have publicly vowed to oppose the plans and legal protections in the Volkswagen law give the state and labour heavy blocking power.
- The push follows years of falling profits in China, weak European demand, tariffs and rising costs, and it has left Volkswagen shares near multi-year lows while forcing a July 9 supervisory-board debate that will decide next steps.