Battery technology and chemistry is export controlled by China [0], which has hurt European attempts at doing what you mentioned [1].

> Panasonic

They have chosen to concentrate on America instead [2]

[0] - https://www.mayerbrown.com/en/insights/publications/2025/10/...

[1] - https://merics.org/en/comment/chinese-restrictions-threaten-...

[2] - https://www.reuters.com/technology/panasonic-localise-its-us...

A car development cycle is/was seven years in Germany. And that was totally fine. When the "Golf 7" comes up, the "Golf 8" doesn't come out only 2 years after.

What happened is the EU (and Germany in particular) left only two development cycles to the biggest industry in Germany (and hence the biggest industry in Europe) to entirely change.

For the EU said: "In 14 years you're forbidden to sell a single brand new ICE car in the EU" (of course they recently changed that tune, but too little, too late, the damage is done).

But that's not all: not happy to drown the german car industry, they decided that the corpse wasn't drowning quickly enough and Germany decided to shut down all their nuclear reactors (I think they recently reversed their stance on that too) and become depending on Russia as a major energy source (which the US warned Europe / Germany to not do).

Of course the shit hit the fan: Russia attacked Ukraine and everything turned to shit.

And now it's estimated German car makers pay their energy price 7x more than was chinese car makers pay their energy.

So, no, it's not all "the lethargy of German economy and business". Germany was (and to some extent still is) producing incredibly fine driving machines: not just VW but Audi, Porsche, BMW and Mercedes.

And those cars did what was asked of cars: drive very finely.

It's eurocrats/bureaucrats and german politicians who killed the german car industry.

P.S: I've got nothing against EVs... But don't be an ideological idiot about it: don't kill your main industry while handing the keys of the kingdown to China. The shift was way too quick. The EU should have been way more cautious and shouldn't have stupidly closed so many nuclear plants (to moreover start burning more coal again).

BYD may very well be pulling ahead on battery tech and vertical integration right now.

In a few years Tesla's primary moat will be political

In the US market, I think Hyundai (and to a much lesser extent Kia) is probably the most interesting OEM. EV sales that aren't declining, the highest American-made percentage vehicles (relevant given recent policy changes), a manufacturing partnership with Waymo, widespread consumer awareness, and relatively lower prices than their competitors. It'd be nice if they provided a better repair situation than Tesla, but that's the current industry I guess.

Then yeah, rich boomers from rich EU countries are leaving scorched earth to everyone except their immediate family.

> without actually being a concrete automotive related issue in the first place...

VW's market share in China (it's largest market) has collapsed - in 20 years it went from around 20% of all cars in China to 10% and current deliveries this year in China have fallen by 36%. This is a huge fall for a company whose Jetta was literally China's Model T.

VW Group has been dependent on China, much of Europe, and the US for almost 2 decades. It lost the American market in the 2010s when Diesel-gate pushed it's American ICP to Toyota, Nissan, and Tesla and it lost it's Chinese marketshare when China began the NEV policy back in the 2010s. And European car sales haven't recovered to pre-COVID amounts.

It isn't entirely an automotive issue, but it is very much a management issue. And nothing can be done about it - voting share is split between Lower Saxony, the Qatari royal family (17% voting share), the Porsche family, and IG Metall. Given the degree of state ownership in VW, it'll make GM's collapse look like a cakewalk.