Volkswagen's difficulties in the electric market
- The Volkswagen brand, leader of the automotive market in Europe for years, indicated when it launched battery electric vehicles, ID3 and ID4 in 2020, that it objective is to quickly become the first brand of BEVs in Europe. The ID3 model was to be, in a way, the Golf of the future and the ID4 model the Tiguan of the future.
- However, in 2023, three years after the launch of the ID3 and ID4, the Volkswagen brand is only in second position in Europe in terms of BEV sales, with 10% market share (compared to 10.5% for all engines combined) behind Tesla which occupies 18% market share of BEV sales in Europe. And the gap with sales of its thermal models is increasing (see graph).
- Even more, sales by models disappoint. Over the first 11 months of 2023, the ID3 (56,650 sales) are sold less than an MG 4 (62,552 sales) or an Audi Q4 E-Tron (61,944 sales). A Fiat 500e sells even more (56,856 sales). An ID4 (72,133 sales) sells better than an ID3, but much less than a Tesla Model Y (219,637 sales) or even a Tesla Model 3 (83,823 sales). We are far from the 100,000 annual sales of Volkswagen ID3 and 100,000 annual sales of Volkswagen ID4, the carmaker's initial objective. Especially since sales of ID3 and ID4 are also disappointing in China and the United States.
- Compared to the Golf and Tiguan with combustion engines, the ID3 today represents 36% of Golf sales and the ID4 48% of Tiguan sales. In addition, we are seeing a very slow start for the ID7 sedan (1,000 sales in November 2023). As for the ID5, it achieved 24,696 sales over the first 11 months of 2023. The design and price of Volkswagen’s BEVs seem to be their weak points.