Sunday long in Munich. The Volkswagen automobile group has presented to the world the four affordable ‘electrical models that it will make in Spain from next year. The German consortium thus materializes, when, he assured that the company would mobilize an investment of 10,000 million euros to make Spain into the center of its production of electric vehicles from 25,000 euros. The objective of the company, which has invited this medium to the Bavarian event, is to “democratize” electromovility.
Of the 10,000 million promised, 70% have been carried out by Volkswagen – 3,000 million to electrify the Barcelona plant, 1,000 million for that of Navarra and 3,000 million to lift the Sagunto’s battery factory (Valencia) -, while the rest will put the entire auxiliary industry that has mobilized to take four vehicles to the streets: the Raval Cupra, the Skoda Epiq and the Volkswagen Id. Cross. “Today is only the first step to become the main technological company of the Automobile World,” said the CEO of the Volkswagen Group, Oliver Blume, on the eve of the Munich Auto Hall, which officially begins on Monday.
Volkswagen’s allusion to technology is not trivial in a car world in which the battle is not only freed in the field of the electric vehicle and batteries, but also and especially in the software, something in which Volkswagen has sought to put the batteries with its millmillionaire alliance with the US car manufacturer Rivian. Both companies have created.
The first of the four Spanish cars to reach the market will be the urban of Cupra – that Wayne Griffiths, former CEO of Seat and Cupra, taught for the first time in 2022—, a vehicle presented this Sunday under a vinyl in which a map of the Barcelona neighborhood of El Raval was shown. This is the flagship, the model that aims to offer a greater volume of sales to the brand, which was created in 2018 to give a higher profit margin to Seat. “For us it is more than a car. What really makes it special is the project behind, which is the family of electric vehicles that we lead from Spain,” said the interim Care Care Care, Markus Haupt, who replaced Griffiths in office on April 1.
After him, the Volkswagen ID will arrive on the market. Polo, whose first images and official name were announced this week. Next to the Raval, the pole will leave the assembly lines of the Martorell plant in Barcelona. Then it will be the turn of the Skoda Epiq,, and the Volkswagen ID. Cross, which will be manufactured in Landaben (Navarra). The four cars will offer maximum autonomies between 425 and 450 kilometers with a single load in their most expensive versions.
These four vehicles, which are planned to reach the market in 2026 – the initial objective was that they leave in 2025 -, they suppose Volkswagen’s entry into a price range in which it was not present so far, that of the 25,000 euros without counting public aid. The company arrives later than several of its competitors, especially Chinese manufacturers such as Byd, which already sells an electric car such as the Dolphin Surf about 19,000 euros (it stays in the environment of the 12,000 euros telling the public aid advanced by China’s own brand). European such as Renault and Stellantis, meanwhile, also offer ‘affordable’ electric cars from 25,000 euros or less, with models such as the Renault 5, the Citroën C3 or the Fiat Grande Panda.
The German group has put all the meat in the grill in this car hall after a black year as was 2024. The company, cornered in China and with the need to reduce its structure, negotiated for months with the unions a job cut that ended up translating and a sensitive reduction of the productive capacity of the German factories. This product offensive in Europe adds to the ads that it has made for the Chinese market in the Shanghai Motor Show in April, when he said he wanted. It is there where the company has been bled to, with a sales fall of 300,000 units in China.
