On Monday, Horn told an audience gathered in New York for the reveal for the reveal of the 2016 Passat sedan that VW had “totally screwed up” by systematically deceiving regulators in the the U.S., installing software in almost 500, o00 of its TDI diesel cars that was created to cheat emissions tests.
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He also said random tests would be conducted on cars made by manufacturers other than VW. Overall, the VW stock has lost about a third of its pre-scandal value – and was already on a downward trajectory prior to the USA allegations.
The scandal has cost chief executive Martin Winterkorn his job and Porsche boss Matthias Mueller was set to be confirmed as his replacement on Friday.
Christian Klingler, Volkswagen management board member in charge of sales, will leave the company because of differences regarding business strategy that aren’t related to recent events, the company said.
A few VW cars being sold in America had devices in diesel engines that could detect when they were being tested, changing the performance accordingly to improve results.
Porsche chief executive Matthias Mueller, according to reports is said to be the front-runner for the top job at VW.
Minister Alexander Dobrindt said authorities would continue working with Volkswagen to determine what cars exactly are involved, and it’s not yet clear how numerous 11 million are in Europe.
The company has yet to announce which cars and construction years are affected, and whether they will have to be refitted.
“There must be people responsible for allowing the manipulation of emission levels to happen”, he told rbb-Inforadio on Thursday.
So far, the “illegal” tampering with emission controls affects about 2.8 million Volkswagen vehicles in Germany with 1.6-litre and 2-litre diesel engines, including light utility vans, Dobrindt said.
Germany’s transport minister said Volkswagen had manipulated tests in Europe too. It was also not clear whether the software would have led to VW cheating on emissions tests outside the USA as well.
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The US Justice Department has reportedly launched its own criminal investigation into Volkswagen’s actions.
