Volkswagen is selling cars in Russia again, but claims it has nothing to do with it
6 August 2024 13:29
Despite the fact that Volkswagen left Russia by selling its assets, its cars are still available to residents of the aggressor country. In early July 2024, the German concern actually returned to the Russian market, starting selling cars under the Jetta brand. This was reported by "Komersant Ukrainian" with reference to the German newspaper Die Zeit.
The Jetta car, a sub-brand of Volkswagen and FAW, which was created and launched in China in 2019, has appeared on the Russian market.
Russian media reported that in July this year, the VA3 sedan and VS5 and VS7 compact crossovers were launched.
The official website of Jetta Motors Russia has now been launched, registered to FAW Osteuropa GmbH, which is the Russian subsidiary of China FAW Group Import & Export Co. This is the same FAW Group that cooperates with Volkswagen in China.
“Chinese VWs have started to be officially sold in Russia: prices. The Jetta brand is entering our market: “a subsidiary of FAW-Volkswagen that produces budget cars. The official website jetta-motors.ru has been launched, and the VA3 sedan and VS5 and VS7 compact crossovers are available to order. These are technical “clones” of the Volkswagen Polo/Skoda Rapid and Volkswagen Taos/Skoda Karoq, which are familiar to Russians, but with some features,” the statement said.
The press release does not hide the “kinship” with Volkswagen: it says that Jetta cars are assembled from VW Group components using German quality control.
The Jetta VA3 is often referred to as the Chinese Volkswagen Polo Sedan, while the VS5 and VS7 are based on the same platform as the Škoda Karoq and Škoda Kodiaq, respectively.
In March 2022, the Volkswagen Group announced that it would stop supplying cars to Russia and halt production at its plants in Kaluga and Nizhny Novgorod. In the summer of the same year, Volkswagen Group Rus closed its office in Nizhny Novgorod. After that, Jetta cars began to arrive in Russia through parallel imports.
A spokesperson for FAW Osteuropa GmbH told German journalists that the company was responsible for supplying Jetta to Russia. Thus, the Chinese company FAW Osteuropa GmbH is the official importer of the Jetta in Russia.
Despite the fact that the cars are officially represented by Volkswagen’s Chinese partner (VW Group), Zeit notes that it is unlikely that this move took place without Volkswagen’s knowledge.
As one of the two companies, Volkswagen “could well be making a profit from this,” writes Die Zeit, asking whether these sales could be made without the German automaker’s knowledge.
Volkswagen itself denies any information about the resumption of business in Russia. At the same time, the Russian website of Jetta Motors stopped opening immediately after journalists contacted the concern with a request for information about the situation.
It is worth noting that since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, almost 1000 companies have announced changes in their strategies for the Russian market. Some have announced a complete withdrawal and ceased operations, others have suspended business or abandoned planned investments, while others continue to operate as before. More than 200 companies continue to operate in Russia.
