The Volkswagen Group Supervisory Board has approved the Future Plan 2030 – the largest restructuring program in the company's history. The concern plans to additionally cut about 50,000 jobs and reduce its model range by approximately 50% by 2035.
The changes will affect not only the number of cars. Volkswagen intends to reduce the complexity of trim levels by 75%: instead of a huge number of equipment combinations, more unified packages will be used. This should increase the production volume of each model and reduce development and production costs.
At the same time, the concern plans to unify platforms, electronic architectures, software, and driver assistance systems. However, technologies will be adapted separately for Western and Eastern markets. The goal is to stop parallel development of multiple solutions for the same task and to scale successful developments faster.
Volkswagen is also reducing excess production capacity. Currently, they are designed for approximately 12 million cars per year, while the new target is around 9 million. Four German plants may gradually lose their current models in the period up to 2034.
For buyers, this means a less wide choice of individual versions, but the company expects to compensate for this with a higher level of technology and lower development costs. In other words, Volkswagen is trying to solve the problem not by releasing more models, but by concentrating resources on those cars that can generate more profit.