Η VW έχει καταλήξει σε συμφωνία με τα συνδικάτα ώστε να μειώσει το εργατικό δυναμικό της μέσα στα επόμενα πέντε χρόνια κατά 30.000. Η γερμανική εταιρία απασχολεί περισσότερους από 600.000 υπαλλήλους, με τις 30.000 θέσεις να μειώνονται μέσω συνταξιοδότησης.
Από αυτές, οι 23.000 θέσεις εργασίες θα περικοπούν στην Γερμανία, με την VW να αναγκάζεται να κάνει αυτό το βήμα, προκειμένου να μειώσει τα κόστη παραγωγής, ώστε να αυξήσει την κερδοφορία του ομίλου (αύξηση του λειτουργικού περιθωρίου κέρδους από το 2% στο 4%), αλλά και να αποπληρώσει ότι άφησε πίσω του το Dieselgate. Επιπλέον, οι Γερμανοί επενδύουν στα ηλεκτρικά μοντέλα, κάτι που σύμφωνα με μεγαλοστελέχη της, απαιτούν λιγότερο προσωπικό, λόγω της μικρότερης πολυπλοκότητας που έχουν.
Με την κίνηση αυτή, το VW Group θα εξοικονομήσει περίπου 3,7 δισ. ευρώ ετησίως, με την VW να έχει συμφωνήσει με τα συνδικάτα στη δημιουργία 9.000 νέων θέσεων εργασίας, οι οποίες είναι απαραίτητες για τη παραγωγή και την ανάπτυξη των ηλεκτρικών αυτοκινήτων. Παράλληλα η VW δηλώνει πως θα επενδύσει 3,5 δισ. ευρώ στην ανάπτυξη των ηλεκτρικών και των αυτόνομων αυτοκινήτων, όπως και στην ανάπτυξη car-sharing υπηρεσιών.
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Volkswagen concludes pact for greater economic viability and a more secure future
• Positive impact on annual earnings of €3.7 billion from 2020
• Compulsory redundancies excluded; socially compatible reduction in workforce
• Investments of €3.5 billion in future-oriented areas
The Board of Management and General Works Council of Volkswagen have signed a pact for the future in Wolfsburg following constructive negotiations. This pact will initiate the return of the Volkswagen brand to a path of profitable growth. The program for the German plants with about 120,000 employees is to significantly improve the competitiveness of the Volkswagen brand and to make the company fit for the future. It will lay the foundation for the transformation of Volkswagen from a pure automaker into a successful mobility service provider in the age of digitalization and increasing e-mobility. The main focus is on reorientation across the entire value stream. By 2020, the Volkswagen brand intends to be completely repositioned. Compulsory redundancies are to be excluded and the workforce is to be reduced in a socially compatible way. At the same time, new jobs are to be created in future-oriented areas. Specifically, the pact for the future is to have a positive impact on earnings of €3.7 billion per year by 2020. Of this figure, the German facilities will account for €3.0 billion. Over the next few years, investments of about €3.5 billion in future-oriented areas of these facilities are planned. This will result in the creation of 9,000 jobs. On the other hand, there is to be a loss of up to 23,000 jobs in conventional areas in Germany, which will be accomplished in a socially compatible way.
The Chairman of the Brand Board of Management, Dr. Herbert Diess, said: “With the pact for the future, Volkswagen will be taking a major step forwards. The pact represents a fundamental transformation of the value stream, the development of new competences and strategic investment. We will be strengthening the company’s economic viability and competitiveness and will be safeguarding the future of our plants. The socially compatible loss of jobs will be offset by the creation of jobs in other units.” Diess emphasized that Volkswagen would be concentrating consistently on the future of the automotive industry. “We will be transforming the entire brand and making it fit for the fundamental transformation of our industry. At Volkswagen, we are taking our future into our hands.”
General Works Council Chairman Bernd Osterloh said: “The most important news is that the workplaces of our permanent workforce will be safeguarded. We have agreed that compulsory redundancies are to be excluded up to the end of 2025. In view of what is happening at other companies, this is a considerable success in troubled times. With the pact for the future, we will be entering the field of next-generation e-mobility. The new cars based on the Modular Electric Drive Kit and electric components from our plants will make our German locations pioneers of electrification within the Volkswagen Group. The Works Council has ensured that these future-oriented vehicles will be made in Germany and not in other countries. Of course, the pact for the future has positive and negative aspects. However, it represents an acceptable compromise for both parties, reached after a long struggle. We have now achieved a reasonable result.”
Dr. Karlheinz Blessing, Member of the Board of Management responsible for Human Resources, said: “The implementation of the pact for the future will bring major changes for many of our employees. They will need to obtain additional qualifications, learn new ways of working and assume new responsibilities. But the effort will be worthwhile: we will make Volkswagen slimmer, faster and stronger, safeguarding employment in Germany in the long term.”
The pact for the future which has now been agreed will be a prerequisite for the successful turnaround of the Volkswagen brand and a milestone in achieving and safeguarding a secure future in the long term.
In detail, Volkswagen’s pact for the future includes the following items:
• Thanks to savings and efficiency improvements in all areas and at all locations in Germany, the company expects a positive annual impact on earnings of about €3 billion from 2020 onwards. The regions outside Germany will also achieve sustainable improvements in earnings. Through their own plans of action, they will contribute about €700 million per year to the pact for the future. As a result, the total improvement in earnings will be about €3.7 billion.
• The pact for the future is to improve the productivity of the German plants by about 25% and to increase the operating margin to four percent by 2020.
• To bring Volkswagen to the forefront of the industry in the future-oriented areas of e-mobility and digitalization, the company will be making a massive investment in new technologies. The German plants are to enter the field of developing and producing electric vehicles and components. A pilot plant for battery cells and cell modules is to be developed. At the same time, the future of the conventional units is to be safeguarded. All in all, Volkswagen will be investing €3.5 billion in the transformation of the company.
• New competences in future-oriented areas are to be developed at the various locations. About 9,000 additional jobs with a secure future are to be created. Volkswagen will mainly be filling these vacancies with existing employees and will also be recruiting specialists from outside the Group. Over the next few years, Volkswagen will be cutting up to 23,000 jobs via natural fluctuation and partial early retirement, taking the demographic curve into account. It is expressly stated that this reduction in the workforce will be accomplished without compulsory redundancies.
• The pact for the future includes agreements on new future-oriented vehicle products. The plants at Wolfsburg and Zwickau are to assume responsibility for the production of electric vehicles based on the Modular Electric Drive Kit (MEB). By investing in e-mobility, Volkswagen will create jobs with a secure future at these locations. In order to ensure efficient capacity deployment, a further model is to be produced at the Emden plant. At Wolfsburg, an additional Volkswagen Group vehicle will also be produced.
• Future-oriented work is to be divided between the main German components plants. Brunswick will continue to produce the battery system for the Modular Transverse Toolkit and will also be developing and producing the battery system for the Modular Electric Drive Kit (MEB). Kassel is to develop the MEB drive system and to be responsible for the assembly of the entire system in addition to electric transmission production. Salzgitter will produce and supply MEB drive system components. In addition, the plant will be building a pilot facility for battery cells and cell modules.
Implementation of the pact for the future is to start immediately and the targets mentioned are binding. Progress with the efficiency improvement measures and the agreed investment in the future will be continually reviewed over the next three years.
Volkswagen Group: Investment planning sets the course for digital transformation and “Strategy 2025”
• Focus on environmentally friendly technologies and vehicles as well as digitalization and connectivity
• Capex ratio will be reduced to a competitive level of around 6.0% by 2020
• Investment policy will be realigned: Instead of emphasizing product unrelated areas the Group will concentrate more strongly on projects for the future
• CEO Müller says: “Volkswagen Group will refine its focus – also with regard to investments and development expenditures.”
Volkswagen Group is adapting its financial planning to current trends and creating a solid basis for implementing “TOGETHER – Strategy 2025”, its agenda for the future. This plan aims to reduce the capex ratio and the development cost ratio to a competitive level in the next few years – despite the huge challenges facing the entire automotive industry. These important financial indicators will be reduced annually, each decreasing to approximately 6.0% by 2020. In 2015 the capex ratio in the Automotive Division was still at 6.9%. In addition, the investment focus will also reinforce the new alignment of the Volkswagen Group: Even in the current fiscal year, investments in product-unrelated areas have been reduced by approximately €1 billion. “This is a major achievement brought about by all brands and companies of our group, and it frees up funds for important future projects,” remarked Matthias Müller, Chairman of the Board of Management of Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft, after the regular Supervisory Board meeting.
“We are also setting the course for the Volkswagen Group of the future,” Müller added. “In order to become a global provider of sustainable mobility, we are pressing ahead with future projects such as electromobility, digital connectivity and new mobility services, equipped with the necessary resolve and financing,” the CEO commented. “At the same time we are investing more selectively and are setting clear priorities. Volkswagen Group will refine its focus – also with regard to investments and development expenditures.”
The planning session has set the stage for preparing the Volkswagen Group for intensifying competition and future mobility. Especially in Europe and China, achieving the strict CO2 standards will only be possible with increased R&D efforts. The entire automotive industry is facing a fundamental transformation: the transition from the combustion engine to electromobility as well as new concepts for mobility services pose huge challenges to all manufacturers. With its strategy the Volkswagen Group also aims to position itself as the driving force in creating electromobility and to bring to market more than 30 purely electric vehicles by 2025.
“In view of the major challenges and the still unresolved diesel issue, this year’s investment planning session took place at a particularly challenging time,” emphasized the Group CFO Frank Witter. The Volkswagen Group must realign but also look ahead, despite these additional strains. “Intense pressure to innovate and rising emission standards will continue to require a great deal of discipline in cost management and investments,” Witter continued. “However, it would be very imprudent not also to invest in the future in this significant phase of transformation in the automotive industry.”
The Volkswagen Group will get important projects for the future underway: autonomous driving and developing a self-driving system (SDS), making battery technology a Group core competency, and creating the new Group brand for mobility services. As in the past, a major part of planned investments for the coming years will flow to the 28 German sites.
Our joint ventures in China are not consolidated and are therefore not included in the plans. These joint venture companies provide their own funding for investments in plants and products.
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