“Volkswagen is continuing to press ahead with the transition to e-mobility despite the limited supply of semiconductors,” said Ralf Brandstätter, CEO of the Volkswagen brand.
This follows the company reporting that last year it delivered more EVs worldwide than ever before, handing over more than 369,000 electric cars (+73% versus 2020), including approximately 106,000 PHEVs (+33%) and 263,000 all-electric vehicles (+97%) to customers.
Volkswagen doubled its BEV deliveries year-on-year, with these vehicles now accounting for 19.3% of Volkswagen’s deliveries in Europe (2020: 12.6 percent).
“In a very short time, we have reached a top position for all-electric vehicles in Europe,” said Brandstätter.
“With our ACCELERATE strategy and the expansion of the model portfolio, we will continue to increase the pace of the e-mobility offensive. Before the end of this year, the ID. BUZZ1 will represent yet another emotional model in our ID. Family.”
Additionally, Volkswagen recorded an increase in deliveries of EVs particularly in the US, China and Germany.
Volkswagen delivered a total of 4.897 million vehicles across all drive systems, to customers around the world, last year. This is a decline of around 8% compared to 2020. The company said lagging supply of semiconductors caused limitations in production throughout the course of the year, which ultimately had an impact on the unit sales figures.
“Volkswagen achieved satisfactory sales under extremely challenging conditions,” said Klaus Zellmer, board member for sales and marketing at Volkswagen.
“The massive effects on production brought on by the semiconductor situation could not be entirely compensated for over the course of the year, however. Nonetheless, our record-breaking order backlog of 543,000 vehicles in Europe alone – thereof 95,000 IDs – shows clearly that the demand for Volkswagen vehicles continues to be very high.”
Volkswagen expects that the first half of 2022 at least will remain highly volatile and challenging owing to persistent supply bottlenecks for semiconductors.
However, the company expects to be able to stabilise production as the year goes on and lower its high backlog of orders as quickly as possible.
