JANUARY 6, 2003

Volkswagen announces big push in America

Volkswagen used the North American International Motor Show in Detroit to announce its plans to push into the US markets, aiming to more than double its sales in the next five years.

Volkswagen used the North American International Motor Show in Detroit to announce its plans to push into the US markets, aiming to more than double its sales in the next five years. The company currently sells around 400,000 cars in the US and company boss Bernd Pischetsrieder says that he thinks that can be pushed up to around 1m. The company intends to use some of its motor racing heritage to help boost sales including launching a "Pikes Peak

Quattro" within the next two years.

Pischetsrieder, incidentally, said that Volkswagen was not interested in acquiring any of Fiat's car brands nor of taking a stake in the struggling Italian car company. This would appear to put an end to speculation that VW would be involved in a new company grouping brands such as Ferrari, Lamborghini, Maserati and Bugatti.

The implication in all this is that if VW is planning a major motorsport programme it will be aimed at the Americans rather than in F1. There have been rumours for some years that Audi is considering an F1 bid. The obvious choice, therefore, would be a bid for victory in the Indianapolis 500. This would put the company up against Chevrolet, Honda and Toyota.