It is the first time that Oliver Blume is presenting the Group's interim report in his new role as head of Volkswagen.

It immediately becomes apparent how difficult the situation is in which he has taken over the helm.

Christian Muessgens

Business correspondent in Hamburg.

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Gustave parts

Business correspondent in Stuttgart.

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The problems of the Cariad software division continue to smolder, which is why the unit is now being reorganized.

Global political crises put a strain on business and jeopardize security of supply, a fact that one has to get used to, as Blume explained in a conference call with the press and analysts on Friday morning.

Challenges in the supply chain have become “the norm rather than the exception,” he says.

Quarterly profit down

The supply of semiconductors improved slightly in the third quarter.

However, the turnaround is by no means strong enough to still be able to achieve the original production targets for the year as a whole.

VW actually wanted to leave the corona-related valley of 2021, when 8.8 million vehicles went to customers, now the value will stagnate, as Blume announces.

The quarterly profit fell by a quarter to 2.1 billion euros, with special effects playing a role, including a write-down on the stake in the US software specialist Argo AI, which started with great hopes three years ago.

Without these effects, VW would have increased profits, also because vehicle prices are still high and support manufacturers' margins.

At least on the demand side, Europe's largest car company is not yet feeling any major impact.

CFO Arno Antlitz said at the conference that the decline in new orders was moderate and much weaker than economic risks and inflation had led to fears.

The group's brands are still working off a huge backlog of orders, such as the core brand VW, which has around 700,000 orders from customers across all types of drive in Europe.

Optimism for 2023

Antlitz even expects a slight tailwind from the market for the coming year, because the situation in chip supply will continue to ease and higher production numbers will be possible.

With this in mind, the industry is expected to see global growth in 2023.

According to Antlitz, things are also going better in China, where the VW Group sells around 40 percent of its cars and has been criticized for its presence in the Uyghur region of Xinjiang.

Deliveries across all vehicle types increased by a quarter in the third quarter, and electric cars made even better progress.

Their sales have doubled to around 112,700 units so far this year.

Blume, who took over the managerial post in Wolfsburg in September and also runs the Porsche sports car brand, emphasizes that he wants to implement his plans for a more efficient group as quickly as possible.

The focus is, among other things, on the Cariad software division, which is to be more open to cooperation: "If there are already solutions on the market, it is not necessary to develop them yourself," he says.