Chairman of the Board of Management of the Volkswagen Passenger Cars brand .
Two years after Diess was appointed , the Volkswagen Group overtook Toyota as the largest car manufacturer in the world . In 2017 , the Japanese lean manufacturer produced 10.18mn vehicles , while Diess and his global team produced 10.31mn . The following year , Diess was made Chairman of the Board of Management of Volkswagen .
Electric vehicles at the Volkswagen Group Despite reigning supreme in car production , Diess is aware that the automobile industry must make radical changes for electric vehicles in order to reach Germany ’ s sustainability goals .
" The customer needs the correct infrastructure to be put in place to live with the cars ,” Diess said at the Financial Times ’ s Future of the Car summit .
Yet work to achieve this has been impacted by COVID-19 and now Russia ’ s invasion of Ukraine . While Diess has said he supports maximum sanctions against Russia , he has also warned that “ another supply chain disruption could cause scarcity of energy and inflation .”
“ This transition into EVs has certain constraints . The plan to get to 50 % EV by 2030 is extremely ambitious ”
10.31mn
Under Diess ’ management , Volkswagen beat Toyota as the world ’ s biggest car manufacturer . In 2017 , Toyota built 10.18mn vehicles , while Volkswagen produced 10.31mn . manufacturingdigital . com 17