Following a devastating first half of the year, 2020 is on its way to recovery for the automotive sector. Car news websites already reported on Ford and its profitable 3rd quarter. It seems that not only the American automotive giant began recovering in terms of sales and profit. Volkswagen is on a similar trend.
The global economic hurdles and drop in new car sales crippled Volkswagen for the first 6 months of 2020. For the third quarter, the sales started to ramp up, driven by increased demand in China. Sales have remained low across other regions.
According to car news websites, Volkswagen reported an operating profit of $3.8 billion. The 2nd quarter financials showed losses of billions for the automaker. The third quarter showed much better performance in terms of sales. However, the positive financial results are not only driven by increased sales but also by cost-cutting measures that were initiated at the start of 2020.
For Volkswagen, China represents the biggest market. The deliveries for July, August, and September increased by 3% compared to the previous year Q3. For all other regions, Volkswagen had a drop in deliveries of 1.1%.
The positive results published by Volkswagen come at a very bad timing as the global economic hurdles are far from over. According to the German automaker, the profits for the entire 2020 fiscal year will be considerably lower when compared with the results from 2019 but it will still be positive. As the market remains volatile, sales forecasts will no longer be issued by Volkswagen. Also, Volkswagen plans to stop the development of new models for its smaller brands. Bugatti is one of the affected brands that will no longer develop a new model and might even be sold.
Volkswagen continues to work on cost reduction measures to improve profitability and reach a stable balance sheet. There has been a lot of hype over the new GM electric Hummer that took car news websites completely by surprise. It has been a pleasant unveil that nobody expected. Compared to the announcement of the electric Mustang, the electric Hummer has been a great success so far.
According to GM, the new Hummer will go into production in late 2021. Depending on how Tesla responds to the news, it is possible to see the electric Hummer reach dealerships ahead of the Tesla Cybertruck. This makes it one of the most important vehicles announced in 2020 and a major PR boost for GM.
Beyond the marketing campaign, the upcoming Hummer EV is an impressive super truck. It comes with three electric motors and an output of 1,000 BHP. The trim level showcased in the marketing video has a range of 350 miles on a full charge. While some top-spec Tesla’s can get better mileage, the power the Hummer delivers is astonishing.
Leaving the numbers aside, the GM EV truck managed to nail the perfect design. It still looks like a truck with no over the top design choices. It has large front headlights that go from side to side and Hummer written inside the lights. This design choice of GM to maintain a familiar shape for the truck received praise from car news websites.
The interior of the truck is also impressive. For the almost $120,000 that early adopters will pay for the launch editions, it certainly feels like a luxury truck. It features a large infotainment system with plenty of physical buttons for climate control and various ride settings as well as a large screen to replace the classic dash gauges. Textile materials are used predominantly throughout the interior as well as soft-touch plastics and golden accents. Even if the Hummer EV will be an expensive truck, nobody had anything bad to say about the move from GM, not even car news websites.