Automotive News is reporting (subscription required) that VW’s CEO, Herbert Diess, is sending a not-so-subtle message to Elon Musk that the Volkswagen Group is coming after Tesla. Diess believes that his company will “keep pace with Tesla” and eventually overtake it. Diess was in Davos Switzerland at the World Economic Forum discussing how VW is investing in software, sustainable vehicles and battery cells. It’s interesting to also realize that Musk is also “taking it to VW” in a certain way with Tesla’s plan to open a new factory in Berlin where (as AutoNews described), “the established [German] players laughed off Tesla as an upstart…that could not compete with their rich engineering heritage.” I recall a similar German luxury automotive attitude with the upstart Lexus brand of Toyota when it launched in the early 1990s. It’s probably good that VW recognizes the competitive threat that Tesla presents to their established business revenue.
Disclosure: I own shares of Tesla stock