Volkswagen of America has knowledgeable its U.S. sellers that the global chip shortage “and different provide chain associated points” will drive prolonged manufacturing hiatuses at its huge plant in Puebla, Mexico, together with an earlier hiatus introduced for its assembly plant in Chattanooga, Automotive Information has discovered.
In letters to sellers this week, VW advised sellers “Regardless of monumental efforts to keep away from extra shut downs, Volkswagen must quickly droop manufacturing at our Puebla meeting plant for simply over three weeks in June and early July, impacting the manufacturing of Jetta, Tiguan and Taos.”
VW is launching its compact Taos crossover subsequent month and the Tiguan is receiving a refresh for the 2022 mannequin 12 months, with new autos anticipated to reach within the fall. The Tiguan is VW’s top-selling car within the U.S.
Within the seller letter, shared with Automotive Information, the model mentioned it might “proceed our deliberate market introduction of the Taos in early June with properly over 8,000 Taos anticipated to ship to sellers in June alone. Nevertheless, on account of this misplaced manufacturing, it’ll take extra time to construct Taos stock as much as our goal ranges, and delay our efforts to stability the FWD and AWD availability.”
In an announcement the automaker mentioned: “Volkswagen de México expects to make additional changes to its manufacturing program, which is able to start in June and at completely different instances for its three manufacturing segments, the resuming of producing actions will re-established regularly as quickly as our suppliers assured to us, we’ll do our greatest effort to get well manufacturing later within the 12 months.”
This month, VW of America product and technique govt Hein Schafer mentioned if the chip scarcity hits the automaker laborious within the second half of the 12 months, it’ll possible prioritize production of the Taos over the bigger, costlier freshened Tiguan to make sure the Taos’ launch is uninterrupted.
Earlier within the week, VW advised sellers that its plant in Chattanooga, would lose two weeks of manufacturing the weeks of June seventh and 14th due to the microchip scarcity. Chattanooga builds the Atlas and Atlas Cross Sport crossovers, in addition to the Passat sedan.
VW has below 40 days provide of stock readily available at its dealerships. The model stories its U.S. gross sales quarterly, and received’t report its second-quarter gross sales till July.