Volkswagen Realigns Vehicle Development Organisation

Pooling responsibility for technology, quality, profitability and deadlines

The Volkswagen brand repositioned its organisation for vehicle development at the beginning of the year. Chairman of the Board of Management Dr Herbert Diess emphazises, “We have to ensure that the corporate responsibility for each vehicle project is clearly assigned. We expect these changes to yield an acceleration boost in development. This step represents a core element of ‘New Volkswagen’, the new strategic direction of our brand.”

Cross-functional collaboration will be strengthened as a result: from the concept to the end of the life-cycle for any given model, the responsibility for technology, quality, cost and deadline compliance, and the responsibility for cost-effectiveness, now clearly lie in one hand for the first time. Until now, these responsibilities were distributed across different divisions and differentiated into individual models groups as well.

The new organisation bundles the competencies into four series groups containing several model series:

1. Small: The small vehicles group such as up! and Polo includes saloon cars as well as small SUVs in future and is headed up by Klaus-Gerhard Wolpert (59), who has led product management for the Volkswagen brand and the Group since 2010.

2. Compact: Also known as the Golf-class group, this group ranges from hatchback and notchback saloon cars and estate cars to SUVs. Karlheinz Hell (52), who has been Group Purchasing Manager for Electrics/ Electronics at Volkswagen since 2014, takes over the management.

3. Mid- and Full-size: This product portfolio ranges from the Passat to the Sharan, and the future mid-size SUV to the Touareg, and is headed up by Dr Elmar-Marius Licharz (45) who has led Product Controlling at Volkswagen AG for Volkswagen brand since 2010.

4. BEV: Battery Electric Vehicles are already present in the brand in the form of e-up!* and e-Golf**. E-vehicles with a greater range will follow in the next step to be developed in this group. The BUDD-e concept car presented at the 2016 CES represents an example of this. The BEV series group is headed up by Christian Senger (41), who comes to Volkswagen from Continental AG, where he led the Automotive Systems and Technology division.

A newly created Strategy and Products Division will also act as a strong partner in supporting each manager responsible for the various series. The responsibilities here will include the definition of life-cycles and coordination of major product events.

“This allows us to provide clear structures and responsibilities, which carve out more time for the workforce to focus on their core tasks. Personal responsibility, initiative and team-spirit will be strengthened as a result,” states Dr Herbert Diess, explaining the new structure in its role as a core element for the change in culture at Volkswagen.

At the same time, the concern here is one of adapting to future requirements arising from progressive digitization, electric mobility and changing customer needs. Diess: “The new series organisation allows a robust product portfolio to be created that is fit for the future, because it strengthens cooperation across all functions hence increasing the profitability of the brand.”

The post Volkswagen Realigns Vehicle Development Organisation appeared first on VWVortex.

from VWVortex http://ift.tt/1PFaUC2
via IFTTT

2018 Lamborghini Aventador S Roadster Review

“Supercars just don’t excite me anymore.” These words, spoken to me over a month ago by another journalist, friend, and (so-called) enthusiast were echoing in my head for far too long, but they’ve finally been drowned out. Drowned out by the wail of a naturally aspirated 6.5-liter V12 engine mounted in the middle of the new Lamborghini Aventador S Roadster. My friend’s point is that back in the good old days, there was a crop of supercars that captured the imagination with amazing style, sounds, performance, and more. Today, it seems like everything is capable of supercar performance, with large luxury sedans outdoing some of the best and most dedicated teams of car nuts, while former pillars of automotive excellence are suddenly pumping out family-friendly SUVs. Beyond that, another league of supercars, dubbed hypercars have cropped up with hybrid gas-electric powertrains that make magical things happen quickly, but at the cost of the acoustic drama, visual flair, and engag...

Project SportWagen: Going Stage 2 with APR

When we last left you, the humble little SportWagen was fresh from the development process with our friends at AWE Tuning, sporting a new downpipe, exhaust and intake, allowing things to breathe a bit easier. The car sounded great, but there was no getting around the fact that our wagon was still quite, well, slow. While we realize that nothing we do to the Golf SportWagen at this point will make it a race car, we still felt compelled to do something . To put it bluntly, we had a fever, and the only cure was more power. Flash forward a few hours, and we found ourselves at Waterfest, staring down APR’s palatial spread and the numerous tuned vehicles surrounding it. Earlier in the year, APR had hinted to us that their 1.8 TSI files would be quite impressive, and based on what they were able to do with the 2.0 TSI found in the new GTI and our time in their Golf R, we knew it’d be worth the wait. So with this in mind, we lined our G...

Project Golf SportWagen- Intro

I’ve never really been one for SUVs and crossovers. The current offerings aren’t the body-on-frame, go-anywhere specialty tools I remember from my youth, and what they lack in capability, they also lack in on-road performance. The current crop isn’t terribly good at handling or being efficient, which in my opinion are major components of our ideal driving experience. So when it comes to space or utility, I usually look for something of the wagon variety- and it seems that I’m not alone. We hit quite a few shows around the east coast each summer, and we see modified Jetta SportWagens at nearly every event. Even amongst common consumers, these cars are highly sought-after. They don’t depreciate much, making even early Mk 5 2.5 versions expensive in comparison to other Jettas or Golfs of the same vintage. This year, Volkswagen launched their latest SportWagen, which is now billed as a Golf. In many ways, this latest SportWagen is the best yet and it has certai...

Vorderman Volkswagen

Search This Blog