Photo: Volkswagen
Volkswagen Group of America has lost two key electric vehicle executives, ahead of the company’s plans to ramp up production of its ID.4, reports Automotive News.
VW Group of America’s vice president for e-mobility, Matt Renna, has departed the company. He has since become head of hardware for autonomous delivery vehicle company Nuro in March, based on his LinkedIn profile.
Director of e-mobility with VW Group of America, Dustin Krause, departed in May. He now works as senior director for automotive partnerships with battery recycling startup Redwood Materials
Krause and Renna formerly worked for Tesla and helped launch the Model 3, until they switched to VW to help launch the ID.4 in the U.S.
Last week, VW’s Chattanooga plant produced its first U.S.-made ID.4, departing the body shop and heading towards paint and final assembly. Pilot production has been ramping up slowly but not enough to keep up with U.S. demand. VW continues to receive ID.4 vehicles from Zwickau, Germany.
According to a report from The Street, Volkswagen CEO Herbert Diess previously said the company could beat Tesla and take the top spot in the global electric vehicle (EV) market by 2025.
“I would still see a chance that by 2025 we are first. At least second,” Diess said in May. Unseating Tesla is easier said than done, though. Despite his longstanding plans to overtake the all-electric rival, Diess himself said earlier this month that Tesla works “twice as fast as the rest of the industry.”
The Volkswagen CEO also previously noted that the race between his company and Tesla will be “tight in coming years.”
Last year, Volkswagen delivered 263,000 battery electrics — second to none but Tesla — for a 97% increase in EV sales year-over-year. Tesla, meanwhile, delivered almost four times as many EVs at a whopping 936,000 units.
Volkswagen is currently gearing up to unveil its first all-electric limousine, the ID. AERO, in China on Monday, June 27. The ID. AERO will launch in the Chinese market in the second half of 2023. According to the German automaker, the new vehicle will represent “the future model for the upper-middle class in China.”
As for the North American and European markets, Volkswagen will show off a production model of its electric limo sometime next year.
After selling 99,000 EVs across all of its brands during the first quarter of this year, Volkswagen said in May that all of its EVs were “sold out” in the U.S. for the rest of 2022.
Tesla, in comparison, delivered a total of 310,048 EVs during Q1.
