The Volkswagen Group is considering the previously unthinkable: closing four factories in Germany and cutting its workforce by 15 percent.
2025 turned out to be a bad year for Europe’s biggest carmaker. Its sales were essentially flat, but profits fell 44 percent to just 6.9 billion euros ($7.9 billion) as operating margins more than halved. The red ink will continue to bleed until 2026, and in March the company announced it would cut 50,000 jobs in Germany by 2030 as part of an adjustment plan. now, according to one report At Manager Magazin, these job losses could be double.
Car manufacturer he did well sold EVs in Europe last year, but sales in North America and China have fallen and continue to fall, and tariffs have had a significant impact.
In April, VW Group CFO and COO Arno Arnitz told investors that the company’s operating margins were “very low” and that it would have to fundamentally change its business model to cut costs and improve efficiency without sacrificing quality. This will “require a significant reduction in complexity in our product portfolio and technology platforms, as well as in the number of entities and decision-making levels,” Arnitz said.
