I know this is more about switching from ICE to electric, but this is kinda hilarious

Feedback about the company's new capacitive multifunction steering wheel was so overwhelmingly negative that last year, Schaffer promised to ditch the design. Meanwhile, much of the range—both electric and gas-powered—is saddled with temperature and volume controls that are touch-sensitive but not backlit, making them all but impossible to use at night.

Imagine that. Get a reputation for cars that are precisely engineered to have expensive parts fail shortly after warranty expiration, and cement that with a brand-wide emissions cheating scandal, and then wonder why no one trusts you.

Boomers only bought your air-cooled offerings because they were cheap. You got no brand goodwill out of the deal.

Sounds like management problem, not an engineering one, but management doesn't have to pay: everybody else does. Typical.

Funny how job incomes don’t scale similarly when brands become “competitive”

Same will happen to other German car manufacturers. This is what happens if lobbyists and corrupt politicians wank each other off behind closed doors. No incentives to go with the times and trying to squeeze out as much money short term as possible

Fuck around and find out

No one wanted touch buttons.

Also, a 4-cylinder engine for atlas is a joke.

they got billions to invest into new drive technologies and didn't

they have really tight contracts with all of their suppliers but didn't act in time to get the electric vehicle suppliers into similar contracts

Surprise ! workers pay the price for the 30 billion they spunked on fines and compensation for cheating diesel emissions.

Good Fuck VW. My mom had an 86 Jetta and that thing was the biggest piece of junk on the road. and every time she took it to the dealer to get it fixed they would do the cheapest thing possible. I ended up taking to my local mechanic who fixed it properly for her.

And also be wary of any good deals on some newer model VW's. They got the court case cleared up where a bunch of cars got damaged by sea water and those vehicles which were supposed to have been sold as scrap are now on the road.

I can't help but wonder how much of this is still fallout from "DieselGate".

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal

I really liked how the car drove but after owning a 2001 Jetta I'd probably never buy another VW. That car had the worst quality control of any car I've ever seen. It was insane how much stuff broke in that car. I'll stick with Japanese cars if I was in the market for one.

This is the best summary I could come up with:

The news organization saw a post on VW's intranet quoting CEO Thomas Schaffer, who blamed low productivity and high costs for the impending cuts.

"With many of our pre-existing structures, processes and high costs, we are no longer competitive as the Volkswagen brand," Schaffer said at a staff meeting.

EVs remain significantly more expensive than an equivalent car with a four-cylinder engine, an effect that's more pronounced in the market segments VW serves.

Lackluster products haven't helped—an ambitious plan by VW Group to master its software destiny has become a chaotic mess, delaying new vehicles in the process.

Feedback about the company's new capacitive multifunction steering wheel was so overwhelmingly negative that last year, Schaffer promised to ditch the design.

VW's board member in charge of human resources told staff that it will look at partial or early retirement agreements but that the majority of the $10.9 billion in cuts would come from savings other than job losses.

The original article contains 315 words, the summary contains 158 words. Saved 50%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

At least they have the id.buzz coming. I've been waiting to replace my minivan, but so far nothing is better than the wearing out one we have.