Volkswagen to impose cost cuts at Skoda: report

[fatbob]

The dealership I work for has five employees who own four vRS Fabias and one vRS Octavia between them.
I think this speaks volumes for Skoda quality and reliability, as the people who work on them would certainly be aware of any quality problems.
In fact one of our Technicians who owns a vRS Fabia has worked for all four brands of the VW Group and he says that Skoda is the best by far.
In my personal opinion I believe VW would be shooting themselves in the foot if they muck about with Skoda, it just doesn't make sense to screw up your most profitable marque now does it? especially when there are (alledged) money problems elsewhere in the group.
Make money now, get out of the hole, sort out perceived brand image later, when profitability throughout the group is good.

[fatbob]

Originally Posted by Lummox

From what i've heard VW are replacing the MK5 Golf at the end of this year/early next year. The MK5 is proving to costly to build and they are going to make the MK6 more cost effectively and it wont have a platform shared with any other VAG car.

I don't mean to rain on your parade Lummox but that doesn't make financial sense, more like suicide, as it has been proven that the shared platform is the most economical way to go.
The only benefit from this would be exclusivity. Hmmm..... benefit? nah don't think so, not in the short term anyway.

[It aint no taxi]

The Volkswagen arm of the group has been in trouble for a while with diminishing sales, think back to last year when Porsche acquired a 20% share in the group to protect VAG from rumoured hostile takeover to protect their longstanding partnership. and now two of the Porsche board are seated on the VAG board.

As far as imposing cuts in Skoda's budget it would be commercial suicide, Skoda have been showing the rest of the group how it should be done for the last couple of years for example MkII Octy Vrs v Golf GTI.

Quick question, when VAG put out tender for design for Bentley Continental GT correct me if I am wrong but was it not found in Skoda design studios???

[jinxy72]

vw need to sell bugatti .... they built the ultimate car at a loss of somewhere near £0.5 million per car !!! just to see if they could do it ..... top gear did a report on it.

select few have this money to spend so makes sense

[Lummox]

The loss Bugatti made with the Veyron is a drop in the ocean compared to the rest of the group and as a marketing excercise was a touch of class.

I also have worked on the four major brands (see sig) and have owned SEATs and Skodas and am going back to the VAG brand should the Primera sell.

I only mentioned about VW as thats what I heard at work (VW dealer)

[OctaviaT81]

Originally Posted by It aint no taxi

Quick question, when VAG put out tender for design for Bentley Continental GT correct me if I am wrong but was it not found in Skoda design studios???

The then chief designer at Skoda (Dirk van Braeckel sp?) who penned the Octavia1 and the Fabia was moved to the same post at Bentley where he designed the Continental.

Skoda also built some of the first prototype cars for Bentley

[Dmac1969]

Volkswagen is slashing its model range in the UK , I read today in my local papers motoring supplement. One of the models they are doing away with is the 130 PD Polo sport...killed off by being far too expensive compared to the Furby vRS , no doubt! In total 9 Polo models are going , 7 Golfs , and they are dropping all but 2 of the short wheelbase Phaetons. They say 'this is necessary to simplify the choice for our customers' ...what it means in reality is somewhat different I reckon!

[gtjunior]

Originally Posted by jinxy72

vw need to sell bugatti .... they built the ultimate car at a loss of somewhere near £0.5 million per car !!! just to see if they could do it ..... top gear did a report on it.

select few have this money to spend so makes sense

I thought that car they made was 5million to make and they were going to sell at 1 million a car so a 4million loss per car??? Either way a lot of money straight down the pan.
All i can think of to add to Vag messing around with skoda is the old saying dont try fixing something that isnt broke.

[Chris_Focus]

Well whatever they may/maynot do with the Skoda arm...just be thankful it's not part of the GM group...worldwide they are losing £2m a DAY

[dstev2000]

I had a choice of company car, I COULD have gone for a Passat with a nice shiny VW badge on it's nose but it would have been a 105 TDI in SE spec.

I chose the Octavia with a 140TDI engine in Elegance spec which is more or less at the top of the range and I was able to throw some more goodies on it as well.

This is becoming a very common thing where people shun a VW in favour of the Skoda brand, you didn't see this 10 or even 5 years ago and that is something that VW top brass have picked up on.

Savvy people know Skodas are stuck together better than the average VW is nowadays and being a Skoda driver the most common thing I hear is "it's a Volkswagen underneath anyway".

If VW want to hit Skoda both in terms of cost cutting and sales all they will do is limit the level of technology that Skoda can access from the VAG group.


And everyone in the VAG group will benfit from the design of the Veyron. Many technological difficulties were overcome and resulted in better engineering know-how and techniques which will filter down to all VAG models in years to come which will ultimately save money.

[fordfan]

Just think of all the money they could save across the entire group by not delivering dented panels, broken windscreens, high value items picked as something of lower value and even the correct number of items.