Serial production of the VW ID.3 kicks off in Germany
VW’s Transparent Factory in Dresden has started series production of the ID.3. This makes it the second production site in Saxony for the electric model after Zwickau. However, the number of units produced at the Dresden MEB plant is manageable.
As with the start-up of the e-Golf in 2017, production of the ID.3 will begin in the Transparent Factory Dresden with one shift and 35 vehicles from Monday to Friday, according to Volkswagen. However, a second shift was introduced later for the e-Golf, thus increasing the daily volume to around 70 vehicles.
Even though the unit numbers cannot, of course, compete with the volumes of the large MEB plants in Zwickau, Anting and Foshan (both in China), the Transparent Factory is only the fourth plant worldwide to build MEB-based electric vehicles in series – ahead of Emden, Hanover or Chattanooga (USA).
“At Dresden we are already converting the fourth Volkswagen site to the new ID. family and the MEB,” says eMobility board member Thomas Ulbrich, who will take over the VW brand’s development portfolio with effect from 1 February. “At the same time we are ramping up volume production in the Zwickau electric car plant and in our two Chinese MEB plants every week. In doing so we reaffirm our ambitions to take on a role as global leaders in electric mobility.”
Volkswagen had already confirmed in November 2019 that the ID.3 would also be built at the former Phaeton factory. At that time, well before the Corona pandemic, autumn 2020 had still been mentioned as the start date. In May 2020, the first ID. Store was opened in the Dresden ‘Transparent Factory’, and the first vehicles were handed over to customers in Wolfsburg and Dresden in parallel to the start of deliveries of the ID.3.
“The Transparent Factory plays an important role within the Volkswagen brand: Here, visitors, customers and guests come into direct contact with the mobility of tomorrow,” says site manager Danny Auerswald. “We are a production plant, tourist attraction, event location, test lab and delivery center – all in one.” Thomas Aehlig, chairman of the Transparent Factory works council, emphasises that they are now technically capable of “producing more MEB models in the Transparent Factory”.
But there have also been changes elsewhere in the manufactory: There is now a second location for vehicle handover, which is also located in the production hall. Last year, VW was already able to more than double deliveries in the Transparent Factory compared to 2019 (from 1,301 to 3,296 deliveries). The target for the current year is more than 5,000 vehicle deliveries, and from 2022 the target is 9,700 deliveries per year.
With reporting by Sebastian Schaal, Germany.
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