Matías Carnero (UGT) is not only the president of the Seat works council, but he is also a member of the Volkswagen Group's supervisory board, the highest control body of the German company. He speaks with ARA in the midst of the consortium's crisis: the group is expected to eliminate up to 100,000 jobs worldwide and significantly reduce its models. The historic Catalan brand Seat could be greatly affected.

It was the year 1948 when the National Institute of Industry (INI), the Italian manufacturer Fiat, and a consortium of Spanish financial entities led by Banco Urquijo agreed to collaborate on the creation of a vehicle plant in Barcelona. Two years later, in 1950, the birth of the Spanish Society of Touring Automobiles (SEAT) would be signed before a notary, which would later become the industrial giant of Catalonia.

The Volkswagen group remains in the eye of the storm. Less than two weeks after announcing its reorganization plan (which will affect hundreds of thousands of workers in Europe and entail the closure of factories in Germany), the industrial group based in Wolfsburg must face a new problem affecting more than 2.8 million passenger cars from the Audi, Volkswagen, and Seat brands manufactured between September 2013 and July 2024.

The Volkswagen Group, PowerCo and the Chinese company Gotion High-Tech have agreed to "deepen their strategic alliance" through a joint venture for the development and operation of the battery cell gigafactory currently under construction in the town of Sagunto (Valencian Community). In this way, the Chinese manufacturer is investing some 1.1 billion euros to obtain 49% of the gigafactory.

The Volkswagen group stars in two of the main appointments of the week: on one hand, Daniel Cortina will be the new director of institutional relations for Seat and Cupra; on the other, Skoda loses its CEO, Klaus Zellmer, who is joining Volvo as executive president. Another notable move is the hiring of Isabel Schnabel, from the European Central Bank (ECB), by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Also noteworthy is the announcement from Delivery Hero –owner of Glovo–, which is backtracking and, finally, Niklas Östberg will continue as CEO, after assuring in May that he was leaving the position.

Little by little, the battle over consumption is shifting to the field of electric vehicles. An efficient electric car represents an absolutely undeniable competitive advantage in terms of range and ease of use, and in a market dominated by Chinese brands, Volkswagen has wanted to strike a blow on the table with its new electric prototype.

The continuity of Seat is hanging by a thread. Although the Catalan brand's models currently continue to have a great market outlet, the Volkswagen Group is studying the possibility of retiring the historic firm by 2029. The decision is part of the restructuring plan being promoted by the German giant, which plans to halve its models and also significantly reduce production. The group's proposal, moreover, will also have serious consequences for the workforce: 100,000 layoffs are expected worldwide.

The Spanish government is convinced that the Seat brand will survive the cuts being studied by the Volkswagen group. In an intervention at the Fòrum Europa Tribuna Catalunya, the Secretary of State for Industry, Jordi Garcia Brustenga, has assured that he has "zero doubts" about its continuity, and has asked the German group to continue investing in the Catalan company and launching "new models." Garcia Brustenga also highlighted the "intangible" value of Seat in the territory. The future of the historic brand is up in the air after the company itself admitted last week that it is analyzing the possibility of eliminating it starting in 2030.

The announcement of adjustments and staff cuts at the Volkswagen group last week – the first of this magnitude in the 89-year history of the brand– will be accompanied by a historic restructuring of the models manufactured by the group to reduce production costs and maintain the competitiveness of the brands.

It is not at all strange that the President of the Generalitat, Salvador Illa; the Minister of Industry, Jordi Hereu, and the leader of the UGT, Pepe Álvarez, among others, have hastened to highlight the importance of Seat not only in industrial terms but also in terms of employment. In a changing world where industries that seemed to have their perpetuity guaranteed find themselves in full transformation (in the automotive sector, from the combustion engine to the electric vehicle), the Volkswagen (VW) group is considering the future of this historic brand, which has been part of the Catalan and Spanish economy since the 50s of the last century. However, over the last few years, the brand has been losing ground in favor of a newer and more modern one, Cupra, created in 2018 as an independent brand.

The cuts at the Volkswagen group have already been approved by the supervisory board. However, it is not clear what will happen to the group's Spanish brand, Seat. While the German press reported on Thursday that the intention is for the Seat brand to disappear by 2029 at the latest, this Friday the Martorell-based company claimed its role within the Volkswagen group, but without clarifying in any case what its future will be.

The Volkswagen Group's supervisory board approved the company's restructuring plan this Friday evening, which will involve the elimination of 50,000 jobs in Germany and the possible closure of four factories in the country—Emden, Zwickau, Hanover, and Neckarsulm—by 2030. The meeting's resolution was expected for this Friday, but the company advanced the result on Thursday evening. The group, however, did not explain tonight what the future of the Seat brand, controlled by Volkswagen, will be. The CEO of the Volkswagen Group, Oliver Blume, in a statement, celebrated the unanimous approval of the restructuring plan as a "decisive" signal for the company's future and announced million-euro investments for the coming years. The supervisory board includes representatives from the founding shareholder families, unions, and the government of Lower Saxony.

The Volkswagen Group confirms its first major workforce reduction in Germany since its founding 89 years ago. After the automotive company announced its plans to reduce at least 100,000 jobs globally, all bad omens were confirmed this Tuesday, especially for the company's workers in the Germanic country. The company will dispense with approximately 50,000 employees in Germany, its main production center with a dozen plants and more than 250,000 workers.

The Catalan car manufacturer Seat is experiencing a sweet moment amidst a complicated period for its parent company, the German group Volkswagen, which is considering severe staff cuts. Between January and June, the Martorell-based company tripled its operating profit, reaching 122 million euros, as reported this Friday in a statement.

The Volkswagen Group is experiencing a severe crisis and is preparing to transform itself. Europe's leading car manufacturer convened the twenty members of its supervisory board this Thursday to discuss the restructuring plan designed by the company's CEO, Oliver Blume. Although the details discussed at the meeting are still unknown, according to a statement from the group, its plans include halving the range of its models. Currently, across all brands, Volkswagen's vehicle range is configured with around 150 models.

The German automotive group Volkswagen reported this Thursday that it will reduce its production capacities by 25% to 9 million vehicles annually to adapt them to the global market situation and increased competition. The company, which has an installed capacity of 12 million vehicles, will also gradually reduce the supply of its car models by up to 50%, concentrating on the most attractive market segments. Currently, the group is configured with around 150 models, across all brands.

The automotive sector is undergoing a major transformation in Europe, and its effects are shaking the continent's major companies. Faced with this scenario, the giant Volkswagen has begun to draw up a restructuring plan that foresees cutting up to 100,000 jobs worldwide and also includes the closure of four plants located in Germany, as reported last week by the German media "Manager Magazin". This situation has set off alarms in Martorell: the Seat plant – a subsidiary of the German multinational – could be affected and, as company sources explain to the ARA, there is a feeling among the workforce that this will be the case, whether directly or indirectly.

The Volkswagen Group foresees more layoffs. If last March the company announced that it would cut around 50,000 jobs in Germany, the German media Manager Magazin reported this Friday that the group plans to reduce 100,000 workers worldwide in the next five years. In addition, the group also has in mind closing up to four plants in the Germanic country – Hannover, Zwickau, Emden, and Neckarsulm – and reducing its investments by 15%, to approximately 130 billion euros. Currently, Volkswagen's workforce is around 625,000 employees. Thus, if the staff reduction goes ahead, it could affect one in six employees of the Wolfsburg company.

This Wednesday, line 1 of workshop 10 at the Seat factory in Martorell has begun the series assembly of the Cupra Raval and the Volkswagen ID Polo, the first 100% electric cars produced at the plant. The launch of production materializes the great efforts the factory has made to electrify: 300 million euros have been invested in the Catalan plant to set up a battery assembly factory, and, furthermore, one of the three production lines has also been adapted to be able to manufacture electric vehicles. In recent years, no 100% electric vehicles were manufactured in Catalonia, although one was produced until the Nissan plant in the Zona Franca of Barcelona closed, the Nissan e-NV200 van.

In 1998, the then CEO of the Volkswagen group, the German Ferdinand Piëch, decided to buy the Bugatti brand to integrate it into the Volkswagen group under the umbrella of the Porsche subsidiary. Piëch's idea was to buy the brand to manufacture the fastest and most powerful car ever made and he set about the project of the Bugatti Veyron, the first combustion car to exceed 1,001 hp of power and with a top speed of over 400 km/h. In 2016, Bugatti went a step further with the Chiron, an even more beastly and exclusive model, of which it has made exclusive limited series sold at seven-figure prices. However, the Bugatti brand has been far from profitable for several years, despite selling editions of its models that became the most expensive production car in history at the time, as in the case of the Chiron La Voiture Noire, a special unit sold for a final price of over eleven million euros. Despite selling cars at astronomical prices, Bugatti's development, design, production, and marketing costs were higher than the income obtained, and the brand's existence within the Volkswagen group was only explained by a matter of prestige.Since 2021 and for the last five years, the Volkswagen Group has managed Bugatti through its high-performance subsidiary Porsche and an industrial agreement with the Croatian brand Rimac. Rimac is an electric car manufacturer that controls 55% of Bugatti, while Porsche controlled the remaining 45%. However, in turn, the Volkswagen Group controlled 20% of Rimac's shareholding, thus guaranteeing its decision-making power over Bugatti and leveraging the know-how and electric technologies of the Rimac brand, specialized in high-power electric sports cars.An advertised sale

This week Porsche has confirmed the sale of its 45% stake in Bugatti and 20% in Rimac to the North American investment fund HOF Capital, based in New York, for an undisclosed amount. This is due to Porsche's complicated financial situation (a few days ago it announced that it would have to lay off 500 more employees in Germany to balance its accounts), which has led to the sale of its stake in Bugatti when the first serious offer appeared on the brand's management's table.Porsche's electrification strategy has been a mixed success for the German brand, as it has invested heavily in its electric models, such as the Taycan or the new Macan. However, the brand's customers have not yet decided to make the leap to electrification, which has led to a repositioning of the brand's roadmap, which has just announced that it will develop a Macan with a gasoline engine, in a clear move aimed at regaining presence and sales volume in its segment.

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