VW battery company to create 20,000 jobs

Created: 07/07/2022, 15:11

Stephan Weil (SPD), Prime Minister of Lower Saxony, speaks on the occasion of the start of construction of the VW battery cell factory.

© Moritz Frankenberg/dpa

The Volkswagen Group wants to employ up to 20,000 people in its newly founded battery company in Europe in the medium term and is also examining the construction of its own cell plants in North America.

The company, called PowerCo, is expected to achieve sales of over 20 billion euros per year by 2030, as VW announced on Thursday in Salzgitter at the start of construction of the first group-internal factory for electric car battery cells in Germany.

Salzgitter - The same amount is planned for total investments.

According to the works council, there should be 5,000 new jobs in the city in Lower Saxony, and almost 7,000 are currently working there in the existing engine plant. Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Prime Minister Stephan Weil (both SPD) also laid the foundation stone for the new halls.

Combustion engine production will continue to decrease and will be phased out in the long term.

However, Salzgitter's PowerCo is to control the majority of the group's battery business.

It is about the entire value chain from the purchase of raw materials to production and recycling.

A research center is also attached.

From 2025, VW wants to produce the so-called unit cell in the new plant, which is being built next to engine production.

It is to be used in four out of five Group vehicles and will halve the production costs for the central battery elements.

So it is intended for models in mass business, not for luxury cars.

Based on a total electrical energy of 20 gigawatt hours (GWh), an annual amount of 40 GWh is aimed at in Salzgitter over several steps.

That should be enough to equip a good half a million electric cars.

This size is also the goal for five other cell plants in Europe.

In addition to Salzgitter, Skellefteå in northern Sweden and Valencia in Spain have already been confirmed.

Applications for the other three locations are expected to come from Germany and Eastern Europe, among others.

Possible “giga factories” in North America are also being prepared.

In China, VW works with the cell manufacturer Gotion, in Europe with Northvolt from Sweden.

Volkswagen is also hoping for more standardization from its plans for "standard factories" for cell production - based on the model of the various vehicle construction kits and platforms.

Together with the major supplier Bosch, the equipment of complete plants is checked.

"This is how factories are created that can be quickly converted to other product and production innovations," explains the group.

dpa