Volkswagen Group has announced plans to invest up to one billion euros in artificial intelligence (AI) by 2030. The investment, which is part of the company’s existing financial planning, was unveiled at the IAA Mobility trade fair. The initiative targets AI-supported vehicle development, industrial applications, and expanding high-performance IT infrastructure.
According to Volkswagen, more than 1,200 AI applications are already active within the company, with several hundred more in development or nearing implementation. The company expects that these efforts could result in efficiency gains and cost avoidance totaling up to four billion euros by 2035 through the scalable use of AI across its automotive value chain.
"With artificial intelligence, we are igniting the next stage on our path to becoming the global automotive tech driver," said Hauke Stars, Member of the Board of Management for IT at Volkswagen Group. "AI is our key to greater speed, quality, and competitiveness – across the entire value chain, from vehicle development to production. Our ambition is to accelerate our development of attractive, innovative vehicles and bring them to our customers faster than ever before. To achieve this, we deploy AI with purpose: scalable, responsible, and with clear industrial benefits. Our ambition: No process without AI.”
Volkswagen is collaborating with Dassault Systèmes to build an AI-powered engineering environment that will support engineers through virtual testing and component simulations. This aims to shorten product development cycles for group brands by about 25 percent—reducing them from 48 months down to approximately 36 months.
In manufacturing operations, Volkswagen continues integrating new AI applications into its proprietary Digital Production Platform (DPP), a cloud system connecting over 40 sites globally. These technologies are used to optimize assembly processes, improve energy and material efficiency, reduce costs, and lower CO₂ emissions.
The company has also launched a large-scale internal education program called WE & AI in spring 2024. This initiative aims to train employees at all levels on responsible use of AI; so far it has reached over 130,000 staff worldwide.
To further advance industrial use of artificial intelligence in Europe, Volkswagen is exploring collaboration on a Large Industry Model (LIM), which would use collective process data from participating companies for training an industry-wide AI model. Catena-X serves as an example platform for such collaboration; it enables secure data exchange between manufacturers like Volkswagen and other founding members including BMW and Mercedes-Benz.
Volkswagen says it supports regulatory changes that foster innovation while calling for targeted incentives such as funding programs for university spin-offs and research institutions aimed at bringing scientific advances into market-ready applications.
Hauke Stars stated: “We support the innovation-friendly evolution of European regulation. In addition, targeted incentives are needed: We must make more of what we’re capable of. This includes, above all, funding programs that strengthen spin-offs from universities and research institutions and accelerate the transfer of scientific knowledge into market-ready applications.”
To increase digital sovereignty and resilience against external risks—including control over sensitive data—Volkswagen plans significant expansion of its private cloud infrastructure within Europe over the coming years.