The Volkswagen Group is eyeing heavy cost cuts across its organisation – including the axing of 50,000 jobs – after its operating margin for 2025 fell to just 2.8%, which bosses have said is "not sufficient in the long run".
That figure, equivalent to €8.9 billion of total revenues, is a huge 53% down on 2024's €19.1bn – a downturn the German giant attributes primarily to the impact of US trade tariffs, exchange rate fluctuations and the costs associated with significantly rewriting Porsche's future product and investment strategy.
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If any company has any capacity to 'slash costs' then it's either been run inefficiently or it's just a prelude to going under (due to quality and therefore reliability issues leading to poor future sales).
Similarly, if it cuts jobs, it means the writing is already on the wall. I would suspect that the data looks far worse than they are admitting. They perhaps foresee a collapsing EU going into recession, and an inability to invest.
So, this comment from VW makes no sense, and they have only themselves to blame for failing to see where the car market is going. There are many car makers in the same boat - JLR, for example. The Chinese will buy that by 2030.