（Cover image source: Reuters）
On March 14th, Reuters reported that Volkswagen plans to cut up to 4,000 jobs in its German factories through early retirement.
According to a statement from Volkswagen, they have reached a unified plan with the labor union, which allows partial retirement for those born in 1964 and early retirement for those born between 1956 and 1960.
It is reported that Volkswagen currently has about 120,000 employees in six German factories, and the job cuts will reduce the workforce by about 3,000 to 4,000 people, with some reports suggesting it may reach 5,000.
Volkswagen has not disclosed the cost of the job cuts, but it is rumored to be close to 500 million euros. On the other hand, Volkswagen will increase its training budget, which has reached 200 million euros, and will not recruit new employees until the end of 2021, except for talent acquisition in areas such as electric vehicles, digitalization, and battery development.
Some time ago, Volkswagen Group announced its “Accelerate” strategy, which stated a target operating profit margin of at least 6% by 2023. In order to achieve this goal, Volkswagen is seeking to reduce fixed costs by 5%, increase factory productivity by 5% annually, and optimize material procurement costs by 7% before 2023. It appears that Volkswagen is now implementing this strategy according to plan.🔗Source: Reuters, Volkswagen AG, Handelsblatt
This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.