Volkswagen model goals to develop a full-electric sedan for international markets that might tackle Tesla’s flagship. It will likely be in-built VW’s residence plant in Wolfsburg, Germany.

The brand new mannequin would slot in above the VW Aero midsize electric car, which is due in 2023, however beneath upper-premium electrical sedans such because the Mercedes-Benz EQS that may debut subsequent 12 months, a VW supply instructed Automotive Information Europe.

“Suppose Mannequin S,” a second supply mentioned.

Whereas the Mannequin S is priced to compete with the upper-premium fashions such because the Mercedes S-Class, its dimensions extra carefully match these of the big premium E-Class, which is within the phase beneath.

VW Group board members this month authorised giving Wolfsburg the model flagship sedan because it pushes to show the longtime manufacturing residence of the Golf right into a “pioneering factory for the extremely automated manufacture” of electrical automobiles.

Influential VW labor chief Bernd Osterloh in September known as for an EV to be in-built Wolfsburg by 2025, demanding that the mannequin use the automaker’s newest technology know-how and latest software program. Osterloh is a member of VW’s supervisory board that makes strategic choices on the automaker.

The demand was reiterated by VW Group board member Stephan Weil, who can be the top of Decrease Saxony, the German state that features Wolfsburg.

VW Group beforehand introduced giant investments to construct EVs at factories in Hanover, Emden and Zwickau with out committing to EV manufacturing in Wolfsburg. An funding plan with a concrete growth funds and estimated manufacturing volumes for Wolfsburg nonetheless must be finalized.

Regardless of its measurement, the sedan would nonetheless match on an advanced model of the MEB platform, which already underpins the ID3 and ID4 electrical fashions and was designed for automobiles within the compact and midsize segments.

Conserving the brand new sedan on the MEB structure would assist VW keep away from utilizing the dearer PPE structure that VW Group premium manufacturers Audi and Porsche will use. The PPE platform depends on costlier know-how to, amongst different issues, pace up battery recharging instances.

The estimated output for the brand new sedan may rise to 300,000 items a 12 months, the VW supply mentioned, if manufacturing can be prolonged to key abroad markets reminiscent of China and america.

Improvement of the sedan can be managed on an elite stage, bundling all actions from engineering to manufacturing, in response to the corporate. This could give VW model a setup much like Audi subsidiary Artemis, which capabilities as a sort of company skunk works centered on delivering the group’s most technologically superior automobile as early as 2024.