The joy at BMW was great about the so-called "business license" in China.

On February 11, the Beijing government allowed the Munich automaker to take a majority stake in its Chinese joint venture with Brilliance (BBA).

"Today marks an important step in continuously expanding our long and successful commitment in China," said CEO Oliver Zipse at the time.

Christian Muessgens

Business correspondent in Hamburg.

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Henning Peitsmeier

Business correspondent in Munich.

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Gustave parts

Business correspondent in Stuttgart.

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Two weeks later the geopolitical situation had changed completely.

Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, there has been concern about the dependence of many German companies on the Chinese market.

Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck wants to slow down the China business of German companies and publicly calls for tougher dealings with the authoritarian regime of the People's Republic.

And the German car manufacturer Opel, at least that's what it looked like, complied with the demands directly and canceled its expansion plans to China a few days ago in publicity.

The reason: not least the political situation in China.

Are Habeck's demands and Opel's about-face the harbingers of a major departure from China?

On the contrary, as a current survey by the FAZ among Germany's leading car companies shows.

The big manufacturers and their suppliers continue to rely fully on China and let Habeck run aground.

Whether it's Volkswagen, BMW or Mercedes or suppliers such as Bosch, ZF, Schaeffler or Continental: they all want to not only continue their business in China undisturbed, but even expand it.

No one has even hinted that they intend to retire.

"The naivety towards China is over," Habeck announced a few days ago after a meeting of the G7 trade ministers in Brandenburg.

He had agreed with his counterparts on a "more robust trade policy".

The Greens had already announced corresponding course changes in their program for the 2021 federal election.

The coalition agreement with the SPD and FDP then stipulated that “strategic dependencies should be reduced” and that human rights violations should be addressed, particularly in Xinjiang, where China oppresses the Uyghur minority.

The VW Group operates a plant in the region with its partner SAIC.

The Wolfsburg have been subject to increasing criticism for years.

VW is Europe's largest single investor

But the company, whose new boss Oliver Blume has just been praised by the Chinese state media for his loyalty to the Xinjiang plant, is now backing down.

When asked about the ever louder criticism of China, Volkswagen replies that they are following “the discussion within the federal government”.

Instead of Habeck's demands, Volkswagen prefers to respond to the fact that Chancellor Olaf Scholz has repeatedly emphasized "that decoupling (decoupling) or deglobalization are the wrong answers to the most recent crises".

"The Volkswagen Group supports the Chancellor's approach," the company announced.

Volkswagen has kept a telling silence about the approach of the Minister of Economics or that of the federal government.

Because one thing is clear: Habeck's statements are not at all convenient for the auto industry, since it not only generates a large part of its sales in China (see chart), but also continues to invest a lot of money in the Middle Kingdom.

Together with the chemical group BASF, the three major German manufacturers VW, BMW and Mercedes account for more than a third of all European direct investments made in China between 2018 and 2021.

This was recently calculated by the Rhodium Group, which specializes in economic and political analyses.

And the VW Group regularly ranked as the largest single investor at the top of all European companies.