VW Will Start Throwing its Weight Around to Beat Tesla

With automakers rushing into the EV market like Forty-niners, they inevitably look towards Tesla. Volkswagen is no exception, and now Herbert Diess, VW’s CEO, says that VW will be able to “stop” the current EV-leader because it has “abilities Tesla doesn’t have.”

Those abilities, for the record, are global scale and manufacturing expertise, which Diess describes as unmatched. And as the world’s largest automaker, there’s at least some credence to his argument.

Volkswagen Showcar I.D. I.D. ? die Revolution. Der erste Volkswagen auf der völlig neuen Elektrofahrzeug-Plattform. Der erste Volkswagen, der für das automatisierte Fahren vorbereitet ist.

Using that scale and manufacturing expertise, Diess not only hopes that VW will overtake Tesla, he intends for the people’s car to become the world’s leading EV maker.

To do that, they will need affordable cars. That will look like the I.D. concept, expected to arrive in 2019 or 2020.

Things look good for that car’s progress, too. Automotive News reports that the final design for the production version of the I.D. hatchback has been approved.

Apparently dubbed the Neo, VW’s first MEB-based car will cost roughly the same amount as the Golf TDI it hopes eventually to replace.

neo

The I.D. will eventually be followed by a flurry of vehicles based on the same platform, including the Crozz, the Lounge (a large SUV designed to appeal to Americans), the Aero-e (a “sporty” four-door sedan), and the Buzz.

That’s not to say, though, that Diess is taking this lightly.

“We have to be careful,” he told Automotive News, “because we have a lot of work in front of us and the challenges that lie ahead are enormous.”

[source: Automotive News]

The post VW Will Start Throwing its Weight Around to Beat Tesla appeared first on VWVortex.

from VWVortex http://ift.tt/2tQHDDZ
via IFTTT

Comments

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