The Volkswagen group with limited breaks in 2022, with 8,262 million vehicles sold worldwide, 7% less. Behind the flagship brand, Volkswagen, 4.5 million sales in 2022 (-6.8%), we also find Audi (1.6 million vehicles, -3.9%), Skoda (731,000 units, -16, 7%), Seat-Cupra (386,000, -18.1%), Porsche (310,000 +2.6%) or even Lamborghini-Bentley (24,400 sales, +5.8%).
Varied positions, from generalists to luxury through premium, and therefore very diverse trajectories, as recognized by Xavier Chardon, president of Volkswagen Group France, guest of Good Evening Business this Wednesday, January 25.
“When we look in a little more detail at what is happening by brand, we have brands in the group that are doing very well, especially luxury Porsche, Bentley, Lamborghini, which are not going through the crisis (…), our growing truck and bus brands.
High demand with still limited production
On the contrary, the year has been more difficult for brands that offer more affordable vehicles, such as Seat or Skoda.
“We have a slightly more negative situation in our brands like Seat and Skoda that are suffering from the allocation of our semiconductors that go to the most profitable brands.”
With things looking to be improving on the semiconductor front, availability of more affordable models could be better in 2023. We must remain cautious, though, with an electric strategy still likely to penalize less expensive cars.
“In each brand we will have models available in two months, (…) but I will have very long delivery times in the models, in particular the plug-in hybrids that are in high demand, (…) our factories are in the process of being installed in the time, but not as fast as the request, stressed Xavier Chardon.
Source: BFM TV
