Affordable mobility: VW makes an electric city car for less than € 20,000

Volkswagen is planning a series of small electric cars based on a heavily modified version of the manufacturer’s MEB electric kit. Autonews reports, citing inside information.

Vehicles should replace the VW E-Up, Skoda Citigo and Seat Mii and cost less than € 20,000, before subsidies. With the electric car premium, this would currently mean end-customer prices of around 14,000 euros, thus reaching the level of current combustion engines in the small car sector.

According to the report, the vehicles will be launched under the Volkswagen brand. The MEB electric car kit used will be greatly shortened so that the vehicles are approximately four meters long, corresponding approximately to the length of the VW Polo.

Volkswagen is currently using the MEB in ID.3, which will launch in the summer of 2020. The challenge for the small city car: Architecture needs to be adapted to save a third of costs. According to the report, VW engineers tried to use smaller electric motors and worked with different battery module configurations to make the vehicle crash-proof.

First save the ID.3

Volkswagen is currently busy preparing ID.3 and appears to have software issues. That’s why vehicles leave the half-finished assembly line and are temporarily stored in huge parking lots. The software must be installed manually later. Meanwhile, VW continues to deliver in the summer of 2020. At a base price of € 30,000, the vehicle may also be too expensive for large sectors of society.