Facing the need to cut budgets, Volkswagen AG has changed its mind about making the ninth generation of its Golf hatchback fully electric.
The corresponding statement was made by Thomas Schaefer and recorded by Autocar.uk. In a recent interview, Schaefer said that the demand for the current Golf generation was solid enough not to dilute the offering further. Volkswagen already has quite a diverse selection of EVs coming to the market under its “ID” badge, notably including the ID.Neo, the ID.Cross and the ID.Polo.
He also admitted that pressure from the Chinese automakers was among the chief factors that prompted Volkswagen to reconsider its research and design processes. With the competition slowly rising on the domestic EV market of China and then spilling over to the rest of the world, the Wolfsburg company found its own best effort lacking.
According to Autocar citing its own sources, there could be other factors as well that contributed to the delay of the ninth-generation Golf. Initially, Volkswagen had intended to equip it with high-capacity power cells, 800V power architecture for rapid charging, and software developed in the U.S. by Rivian. Some sources suggest that the company ran into problems implementing these features and had to shift the entire development schedule.
In short, it’s currently unclear whether the next generation of the Golf will be all-electric or not. The one thing that’s official is that it won’t arrive until at least 2030.