Volkswagen To Out Manufacture Tesla on Electric Cars. But it will take a few years. Can Tesla Survive?

VW maps plan to overtake Tesla in electric cars

BERLIN-- Volkswagen AG has pulled into Tesla Inc.'s rearview and vowed to overtake the electric car pioneer with a massive rollout of battery and hybrid models over the next five years and production facilities around the world.

 From article, (Volkswagen's brands are planning to launch 50 new electric models and 30 new hybrids by 2025 and to create electric versions of its entire range of more than 300 models by 2030.

Volkswagen aims to sell three million electric vehicles a year by 2025.

By comparison, Tesla sold 102,807 cars last year, mainly its high-end Model S sedan and Model X sport-utility vehicle. Production of the Model 3, the company's first large-volume family sedan, began last year, but Tesla has struggled to meet production goals. It has taken about 500,000 orders for the Model 3 but is well below its target of building 250,000 cars a year.

On Tuesday, Volkswagen Chief Executive Matthias Müller said that his company, which owns a dozen brands including VW, Audi, Porsche, Skoda, Bentley and Lamborghini, would launch a new electric vehicle "virtually every month" from 2019.

Global demand for electric cars is still only a tiny fraction of new car sales and it is far from certain that the huge investments Volkswagen and other car manufacturers are making is going to pay off.

"The absolute numbers are still small," Mr. Müller told reporters Tuesday. "But that will change at the latest when the first models of the next e-generation come to market."

The company has already invested nearly half the EUR50 billion it has earmarked for batteries as it ramps up electric vehicle production to three million cars a year by 2025.

It has secured battery supply from China's Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd. and South Korea's Samsung SDI Co. and LG Chem Ltd.

Traditional auto makers' aggressive push into electric cars is putting pressure on Tesla. While the technology leader is having trouble ramping up production of its Model 3 , Volkswagen already has a global network of more than 100 factories and years of experience.

new electric car plants are expected to be built inside existing factories and will use standard underlying technology to create greater scale and cut costs. It is the same strategy Volkswagen used to create savings in production of its conventional cars.)

For More Info