- Volkswagen is reportedly weighing cuts of up to 100,000 jobs worldwide and the closure of four German plants — Hanover, Zwickau, Emden and Audi’s Neckarsulm facility — affecting more than 45,000 workers.
- The figure would double a 2024 union agreement that already set a target of eliminating around 50,000 positions.
- First-quarter 2026 net profit fell 28% year-on-year to €1.56 billion; CFO Arno Antlitz says US tariffs cost the group roughly €4 billion annually.
- China sales fell 20% in Q1 as BYD and other domestic brands continue eroding VW’s position in its largest market; VW shares have lost more than a quarter of their value this year.
- Volkswagen is also reportedly considering spinning off its core VW brand and components business into separate companies, and cutting investment by 15% over five years.
- Unions IG Metall and VW’s General Works Council have vowed to fight the plans “with all our might”; a supervisory board discussion is scheduled for July 9.
Berlin, June 26, 2026 (Agencies) — Volkswagen is considering closing four German factories and cutting up to 100,000 jobs, Reuters reported Friday, in what would become the most radical restructuring in the automaker’s 89-year history.
Should the cuts go ahead, Volkswagen would close factories in Hanover, Zwickau and Emden, as well as an Audi plant in Neckarsulm, Reuters reported, citing sources within the company. Those four sites together employ more than 45,000 workers, and their closure would come on top of the roughly 50,000 layoffs already agreed upon with trade unions in 2024 — meaning the overall reduction could reach 100,000 positions, or about 15% of VW’s global workforce, if the full plan is confirmed.
According to a separate report by Germany’s Manager Magazin, chief executive Oliver Blume has already presented the restructuring proposal to the management board, and the company is weighing a 15% cut in investment over the next five years. The Manager Magazin report also said Volkswagen is considering a fundamental overhaul of its corporate structure, spinning off the core Volkswagen brand and its auto-parts business into independent companies — a move that could make it easier to list individual businesses on capital markets in the future. A second insider told Euronews the key planning document deliberately avoids naming a specific job-cut figure, to leave flexibility in how the restructuring is ultimately carried out.
Reuters reported that supervisory board members have already been briefed, with a formal discussion scheduled for July 9. A Volkswagen spokesperson declined to comment on what the company called “internal, confidential documents,” saying only: “The relevant facts of the matter will be discussed and approved by the relevant bodies. We will not pre-empt this process.” The spokesperson added that “the entire group, including its brands and subsidiaries, must undergo far-reaching change.”
The pressure behind the plan is visible in Volkswagen’s recent financial results. First-quarter 2026 net profit slumped 28% year-on-year to €1.56 billion, while revenue fell 2% to €75.7 billion. CFO Arno Antlitz issued an unusually blunt warning at the time: “The cost savings planned so far are not enough. If we fail to do this, we are putting our future at risk.” Antlitz has also put the annual cost of US tariffs at roughly €4 billion. Volkswagen shares fell to their lowest level in 16 years on Friday, slipping further on the news, and have shed more than a quarter of their value so far in 2026 — a sign markets remain unconvinced the restructuring will be enough to turn the company around.
Volkswagen employs more than 657,000 people worldwide, almost half of them in Germany, but has been forced to scale back domestic production since 2022, when Berlin’s decision to abandon Russian gas imports in favor of renewables and costlier American liquefied natural gas left German industry reeling from higher energy costs. The German economy has since experienced two years of contraction followed by two years of sub-1% growth. Volkswagen already closed one assembly plant, in Dresden, last December — the first factory closure in Germany in the company’s nine-decade history — and more than a dozen other German manufacturers, including BASF, Bosch and Continental, have shuttered one or more facilities over the past four years.
Competition from China has compounded the pressure. China sales fell 20% in the first quarter of 2026 as homegrown rivals, led by BYD, continue to erode Volkswagen’s position in what was once its largest and most profitable market; the company now sells fewer vehicles there than domestic brands BYD and Geely. In Europe, Chinese brands BYD, Chery, SAIC and Leapmotor have all doubled their market share over the past year, squeezing VW’s electric-vehicle lineup just as rising energy costs erode its cost advantage at home.
Unions have already signaled they will resist the plan. Volkswagen’s internal works council and the IG Metall metalworkers’ union vowed in a joint statement Friday: “Should such plans go ahead, we would do everything in our power to prevent them.” VW has existing job-security agreements with the core brand in place until 2030, and with Audi through 2033, setting up a likely confrontation as the supervisory board takes up the proposal next month.