[dailydriver]

Very very interesting partnership. While Tata is on the way up, building one good car after another, VW is still struggling to tide over the shadow of Dieselgate. Past experiences indicate that the marriage may not last too long. However, the new ethos that are guiding these companies may indeed work out in their favour and bring them out of the existential crisis that they push themselves into ever so often.

Sharing of technical know how and cross platform builds will only work as long as they make a firm commitment not to copy absolutely anything from each other's service centre offerings. VASS and TASS shall never meet should be their motto.

[volkman10]

Volkswagen underlines the emerging market Strategy in its Annual Media conference today. Reinforces the path to the 2025 strategy accomplishment.

Emerging Markets: VW’s plan to enter what is called the “booming economy segment” would play a key role in the firm’s continued recovery.

Successively develop economy markets, extend model range!

- First Model in 2018 for China with partnership with JAC
- First Model in 2019 for India in partnership with TATA






Source:Volkswagen

[shortbread]

I think before everyone get's carried away with this proposal one needs to take a step back and have a more pragmatic view of things!

VW are desperate to win back shareholder trust after the epic F'up. Being a large hegemonic corporate their response to this fiasco is using fancy buzz words/strategies including: 'environment', 'economy of scale', technological revolution' etc....etc... Tata is just one part of this all-new 're-invention' (cough...cough) of VW! Make no mistake, no one is reinventing the wheel here, VW have been here and done this before.

In real terms VW constitutes the worst of what large incumbent corporations represent. They have done platform sharing, economy of scale projects, etc...etc... before as well. Heck they own more brands than we can count on our two palms, how many more co-operations would VW need?! Their margins are among the worst in the industry. VW survives today because of its market domination in China (similar to Maruti in India) and the healthy operations of Porsche, Audi and Skoda. The arrogance they showed in their relationship with Suzuki shows that this wont be the easiest of partners. The good this is that Tata is not Suzuki and is no push-over.

The real lynch-pin in this relationship is Skoda. Their product line up and launches have always been matured and phased. Skoda's Achilles heel is that they are forcibly moving upmarket as they rely on expensive VW platforms. If Skoda needs a more affordable line of models to compete with the Korean and French domination of the small car market in Europe, they need an affordable platform.

I believe Skoda and Tata can leverage this relationship. Tata should not allow VW treat it as a 'local operative', but look at this opportunity to garner volumes by looking for International exports.

[RavenAvi]

This is how the joint alliance of Tata Motors, Skoda and Volkswagen is likely to pan out by sharing the common AMP platform between the 3 companies:

Received on WhatsApp.

[RSR]

^ ^ ^ If the above scenario plays out, then it means things would actually get worse for both, Škoda and Volkswagen (in India) for the next two years (till 2019) before they get better!

If Škoda & Volkswagen have no sub-10 lac rupee product coming out in the next two or three years, then their marketshare would only reduce further. As the new India-specific products will have to be developed from scratch on Tata's new AMP platform, it's quite reasonable to assume they won't be out in the market before 2019/2020. Which means Škoda and Volkswagen will have to manage with products like the Vento/Rapid, Polo, Ameo in these segments till then.

Marketshare loss doesn't necessarily mean financial loss for Škoda and Volkswagen, of course. They can still make enough money from their more expensive products to remain profitable, even if they go down in terms of marketshare.

[dZired]

Rumour: Skoda to launch small sedan, SUV under VW-Tata deal

Volkswagen and Tata had announced a product development partnership earlier this year, under which, the two carmakers will be sharing technologies and components in order to develop new products at fairly minimum R&D costs. Reports now suggest that Skoda is mulling over the possibility of introducing a small SUV and an entry-level sedan in India, under the said partnership.

Source: ET Auto

[jaganpec2002]

The partnership could be called off

Source: AutoCar India

[Latheesh]

May be VW learnt the basics of developing low cost platforms from Tata, and going to apply their learning to modify VW MQB? Just speculating!

[RavenAvi]

Originally Posted by Latheesh

May be VW learnt the basics of developing low cost platforms from Tata, and going to apply their learning to modify VW MQB? Just speculating!

Nope. Different reason.

Apparently Skoda engineers convinced the VW-Skoda top honchos that with the amount of investment needed to adapt the AMP platform in the joint venture with Tata Motors, the MQB-A platform could be easily developed and localised for the Indian market with the same invested amount.

Sources say that for VW and Skoda to jointly develop and adapt the AMP for its own ‘top hats’ could cost an estimated 140 million euros (around Rs 1,000 crore). Skoda engineers have convinced the top management that with such an investment, it’s possible to develop and localise the MQB-A platform for India.

VW and Skoda’s high-volume cars are based on the now-defunct PQ25 platform and, hence, to introduce a new range of products, the two VW Group brands may have no choice but to bite the bullet and invest in MQB. “In the long term, it is better to develop our own platform as that gives us control of our destiny,” says a VW Group source.

Autocar Professional

[motorworks]

Skoda-VW have certain core values in their products like build quality which might have been diluted or compromised if they had resorted to a platform from Tata. This is just my assumption and not based on any facts, so I'm sort of happy so see Skoda and VW bring something to the table on their own especially if that happens to be the MQB-A platform. Localising the MQB-A might give them scale to launch more models unlike the current scenario where the PQB platform has just 3 cars.

[bharath79]

A welcome change from the continuous focus on Jeep Compass. I am glad we can have the MQB platform at some point of time even if it is going to cost us a lot of money relatively.

Regards
Bharath

[AMG Power]

It's a no brainer that this was bound to happen.

My post about a month ago:

Originally Posted by AMG Power

..
The key area is the cultural differences between the organisations which has been the fall out of the Tata - Suzuki alliance too. And even when an alliance with Tata worked as it did with Fiat, it was a disaster.

So there's going to be many a slip between the cup and lip and VW cannot wait for everything to be sorted to roll out new cars as nothing has been decided yet as to which models will be launched though this partnership.
.....

[VKumar]

A welcome move in my opinion, and I hope we will get to see the new Polo on our shores quite early now. This particular move kept on giving me nightmares that there will be no future of the chic VW hatch, Polo as there will be something coming in lower segments.

Bring in new Polo and more competent products, and improve the A.S.S., nothing else we need from VW.

[GTO]

It was a stupid idea to begin with, and the last thing either company needs right now. Tata is finally getting its product & quality right, and can do without the distraction. VW is neither here nor there in India and needs to gear up for the new Polo (as well as other cars).

VW anyway has so much platform-sharing between its own brand cars and that of Skoda, Audi etc.

[shortbread]

Originally Posted by shortbread

I think before everyone get's carried away with this proposal one needs to take a step back and have a more pragmatic view of things!

VW are desperate to win back shareholder trust after the epic F'up. Being a large hegemonic corporate.........

So all the announcements and presentations have amounted to a big ZERO!

It's not surprising as most VW alliances end up in a tragedy! They expect one way traffic and somehow be at the beneficial end of things. Albeit years of owning the largest portfolio of car brands VW are still struggling with margins and profitability.

This is only good news for Tata, last thing they wanted was to prepare itself for producing volumes only for VW to pull out at the last moment. I am also not sure how committed VW will be towards the Indian market in the long and challenging run ahead!

Tata is much better going at this alone.

Tata, VW split will mark a no-win end

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/...cle9741998.ece