Volkswagen’s ID.3 electric vehicle (EV) has made its first appearance in China at the Chengdu Motor Show. This comes as Volkswagen intensifies its electric car offensive in China as part of its ACCELERATE strategy.
The ID.3, which is one of the best-selling electric cars in many European countries, will also be available on the world’s largest emobility market from the fourth quarter of this year.
Ralf Brandstätter, Volkswagen CEO, said: “Volkswagen’s global electrification offensive is rapidly gaining further momentum. After the ID.4 and the ID.6, we are now launching the ID.3 as the third all-electric model series in China within a mere six months.
“We are thus underscoring our ambition to occupy a leading position in the market for electric vehicles in China as well as Europe.”
Following the debut at the motor show in Chengdu, Chinese customers will be able to reserve an ID.3 before the market launch in October. Both the ID.4 and ID.6 have already seen a growing number of customers in the last few months.
As a result, deliveries of vehicles from the ID. family in the region have doubled in the past three months. Numbers have risen from 1,500 units in May to 3,000 in June and 5,800 in July.
As a result, Volkswagen was already among the top 10 manufacturers in the Chinese electric car market in July. By year-end, 80,000 to 100,000 vehicles from the ID. family are expected to be delivered to customers in China. This figure is subject to the supply situation for semiconductors, though.
Stephan Wöllenstein, Volkswagen China CEO, said: “With the ID.4 and ID.6 we have successfully launched two strong model series in recent months. Feedback from our customers is promising, delivery figures meet our expectations.
“With the ID.3, we are now offering our customers a product in the important compact segment and, in combination with the other ID. models, are able to cover a large share of the market.”
Volkswagen is stepping up the pace of the global electric car offensive with its ACCELERATE strategy. By 2030, Volkswagen intends to increase the share of its all-electric vehicle deliveries in Europe to over 70 percent. In North America and China, the brand is targeting an EV share of over 50 percent.
In the first half of 2021, Volkswagen delivered almost three times as many electric vehicles worldwide compared to the same period in 2020. This was despite the difficulties with semiconductor supplies. Volkswagen sold 160,000 units in total, which included 66,000 plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) and an impressive 93,000 battery electric vehicles (BEVs).
In the half of the year, Volkswagen held pole position in the European market for all-electric vehicles. This accounted for a market share of 15.4 percent.