The Volkswagen Zwickau-Mosel Plant (German : Volkswagenwerk Zwickau) is an automobile factory in today's Zwickau district of Mosel, Germany. Founded on 26 September 1990, together with the Chemnitz plant and the Transparent Factory, it belongs to Volkswagen Sachsen, based in Zwickau. Currently (as of spring 2019), the Zwickau plant has about 8,000 employees. [1] Signalling a milestone the last combustion vehicle was produced on 26 June 2020. [2]
With the founding of Horch and Audi in 1904 and 1909 respectively, Zwickau became the cradle of the Saxon automobile industry. [3] Due to the traditions of automotive engineering in the region and because of the skilled workers potential, Volkswagen decided as the first large enterprise of the Federal Republic to build up a completely new work in Saxony and provided for it considerable investments. As a result, other investors settled in the region.
Already in the final phase of the GDR the Trabant 1.1 was built in the northern Zwickau suburb of Mosel from 1989 with a four-cylinder four-stroke engine manufactured under VW license. The production was discontinued in 1991, because parallel to this one the mass production of the Volkswagen Polo Mk2 had already started on 21 May 1990 in the Mosel factory. On 15 February 1991, the production of the Volkswagen Golf Mk2 began parallel to the Polo production, whose successor is still produced today in the Zwickau plant. [4] The suburb Mosel was incorporated into Zwickau on 1 January 1999. In 2007, they officially introduced the new factory designation Volkswagen-Fahrzeugwerk Zwickau.
Since production began in 1990, around 6 million Volkswagen vehicles have been delivered. [2] In 2010, 1,350 vehicles of the VW model series Golf and Passat left the production lines of the Volkswagen plant every day. With 250,000 vehicles, 2010 was a record result. In addition, there are the bodies for the luxury class vehicles Phaeton and Bentley Continental GT, which are completely painted with special transporters in the "Transparent Factory" Dresden or after Crewe in England. Since 2001, around 100,000 bodies have been produced for the Phaeton and Bentley Continental series (50,000 each). Since 2017, bodies for the Bentley Bentayga and since 2018 bodies for the Lamborghini Urus have been produced at the Zwickau plant. [5]
On May 11, 2004, the festive event for the 100th anniversary of the founding of Horch. High-ranking persons from politics and economics appreciated the scientific and technical achievements of the car makers from southwest Saxony in their greetings.
Directly adjacent is also a factory of the supplier GKN Driveline.
In 2019, the factory was completely converted to the production of electric cars. [6] The last internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicle rolled off the Zwickau plant on 26 June 2020. The car is a seventh generation Golf R Estate with 2.0-litre petrol engine in Oryx White Pearl Effect. It is the 9,512,001th ICE vehicle produced in the plant, effectively ended 116 years of ICE vehicle assembly in Zwickau-Mosel. [7]
Audi AG is a German automotive manufacturer of luxury vehicles headquartered in Ingolstadt, Bavaria, Germany. A subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group, Audi produces vehicles in nine production facilities worldwide.
Volkswagen is a German automobile manufacturer headquartered in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1937 by the German Labour Front under the Nazi Party and revived into a global brand after World War II by the British Army officer Ivan Hirst, it is known for the iconic Beetle and serves as the flagship brand of the Volkswagen Group, the largest automotive manufacturer by worldwide sales in 2016 and 2017. The group's biggest market is in China, which delivers 40 percent of its sales and profits. Its name is derived from the German-language terms Volk and Wagen, translating to "people's car" when combined.
Volkswagen AG, known internationally as the Volkswagen Group, is a German multinational automotive manufacturer headquartered in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. The company designs, manufactures, and distributes passenger and commercial vehicles, motorcycles, engines and turbomachinery, as well as offers related services, including financing, leasing, and fleet management. In 2016, it was the world's largest automaker by sales, and keeping this title in 2017, 2018, and 2019, selling 10.9 million vehicles and was the largest automaker by revenue in 2022. It has maintained the largest market share in Europe for over two decades. It ranked seventh in the 2020 Fortune Global 500 list of the world's largest companies.
Zwickau is, with around 87,500 inhabitants (2020), the fourth-largest city of Saxony, Germany, after Leipzig, Dresden and Chemnitz and it is the seat of the Zwickau District. The West Saxon city is situated in the valley of the Zwickau Mulde, and lies in a string of cities sitting in the densely populated foreland of the Elster and Ore Mountains stretching from Plauen in the southwest via Zwickau, Chemnitz and Freiberg to Dresden in the northeast. From 1834 until 1952, Zwickau was the seat of the government of the south-western region of Saxony.
The Volkswagen Phaeton is a full-size luxury sedan/saloon manufactured by the German automobile manufacturer Volkswagen, described by Volkswagen as their "premium class" vehicle. Introduced at the 2002 Geneva Motor Show, the Phaeton was marketed worldwide. Sales in North America ended in 2006 and global sales ended in 2016.
Auto Union AG, was an amalgamation of four German automobile manufacturers, founded in 1932 and established in 1936 in Chemnitz, Saxony. It is the immediate predecessor of Audi as it is known today.
The Transparent Factory is a car factory and exhibition space in Dresden, Germany owned by German carmaker Volkswagen and designed by architect Gunter Henn. It originally opened in 2002, producing the Volkswagen Phaeton until 2016. As of 2017 it produces the electric version of the Golf.
Horch was a car manufacturer, founded in Germany by August Horch & Cie at the beginning of the 20th century.
Volkswagen Group of America, Inc., is the North American operational headquarters, and subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group of automobile companies of Germany. VWoA is responsible for five marques: Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, and Volkswagen cars. It also controls VW Credit, Inc., Volkswagen's financial services and credit operations. The company is headquartered in unincorporated Fairfax County, Virginia, near Herndon.
FAW-Volkswagen Automobile Co., Ltd. is a joint venture between FAW Group and Volkswagen Group which manufactures Audi and Volkswagen marque passenger cars for sale in China. It was founded on 6 February 1991.
The automotive industry in Germany is one of the largest employers in the world, with a labor force of over 857,336 (2016) working in the industry.
The Volkswagen Bratislava Plant is an automotive factory and co-located test track owned by Volkswagen Group in Bratislava, Slovakia.
AutoMuseum Volkswagen is an automobile museum in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Opened in April 1985, it is one of two museums in Wolfsburg devoted to the history of the Volkswagen brand; the other is at nearby Autostadt.
The Volkswagen ID.3 is a battery electric small family car (C-segment) produced by Volkswagen since 2019. It is the first production car to utilize the MEB platform, and the first model of the ID. series. It was unveiled on 9 September 2019 at the Frankfurt Motor Show, after being first shown as the I.D. concept car at the 2016 Paris Motor Show. Deliveries to retail customers began in Germany in September 2020.
The Volkswagen Group MEB platform is a modular car platform for electric cars developed by the Volkswagen Group and its subsidiaries. It is used in models of Audi, Cupra, Škoda, and Volkswagen, along with Ford through partnership. The architecture is aimed to "consolidate electronic controls and reduce the number of microprocessors, advance the application of new driver-assistance technology and somewhat alter the way cars are built" by the VW Group.
The Audi Q4 e-tron is a battery electric compact luxury crossover SUV produced by Audi. It is based on Volkswagen Group's electric MEB platform and is the fourth fully-electric model in the Audi e-tron series after the Audi Q8 e-tron, e-tron GT and Q2L e-tron. Production began in March 2021, with the production version being unveiled in April 2021.
The Volkswagen ID.4 and Volkswagen ID.5 are battery electric compact crossover SUVs produced by Volkswagen. Based on the MEB platform, the ID.4 is the second model of the Volkswagen ID. series. The production version of the ID.4 debuted in September 2020 as the first fully-electric crossover SUV under the Volkswagen brand, while the coupe-shaped variant of the ID.4 is marketed as the Volkswagen ID.5 and was revealed in November 2021.
The Volkswagen ID.6 is a battery electric mid-size crossover SUV with three-row seating produced by Volkswagen in China from 2021. It is based on the MEB platform, and part of the ID. series electric vehicle line-up. In China, the FAW-Volkswagen joint venture will produce and market the ID.6 Crozz, whereas SAIC-Volkswagen will build and market the ID.6 X with a slightly altered styling. As of April 2022, it is the second largest vehicle of the Volkswagen ID. series, and the second largest built on the MEB platform.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
