VW to adopt Audi's development method

By Jason Stein, Automotive News Europe

Tunis, Tunisia - Volkswagen - which has pioneered module sharing - will learn some new tricks on the subject from sister brand Audi.

By using Audi's modular architecture strategy, VW hopes to reduce development times by a year and significantly expand its portfolio, said Ulrich Hackenberg, VW's new development boss.

"We will increase the number of cars we have in our lineup," Hackenberg told Automotive News Europe during the press launch here of the new Touareg premium SUV. "With the new strategy, we will need less time and fewer people to create new vehicles."

Hackenberg also said VW wants to launch more cars at a faster rate.

Hackenberg helped develop Audi's modular architecture strategy, which the carmaker calls MLB, while he was the German luxury brand's head of research and development.

MLB is a German acronym that means modular-length components in English. Using MLB should allow for a 40 percent increase in production efficiency and more "invisible" component sharing across VW's model range.

The first example of an MLB-developed vehicle is the Audi A5 premium coupe, which debuts at this week's Geneva auto show.

Hackenberg said VW's current system allows the automaker to produce a high number of cars based on one platform and shared modules. VW produces variants by placing a "hat" over an existing architecture.

With Audi's system, an entire modular architecture is designed from the beginning and can be shared throughout the model range.

That means it takes less time to develop a higher number of unique, niche products that have flexible dimensions and capabilities.

"You have lead times for tooling that are longer," using the current VW system, Hackenberg said. "With Audi's modular design, you can cut nearly a year out of development time from the design freeze to start of production."

For example, redesigning a complete product based on the current VW approach takes 36 months. At Audi it takes 25 months.

Benefit for suppliers

The MLB approach also increases overall quality and allows a carmaker to approach fewer suppliers, which could produce higher volumes for specific components.

Hackenberg said the first VW models to use MLB could arrive in 2012. That is when VW will re-engineer and launch the next Golf.

Development already is done on the next Golf, which is due next year.

"It takes time because VW will need to change its entire approach to development," said Christoph Stürmer, an analyst at Global Insight's Frankfurt office. "It's a complete change in the engineering mindset and how you go about things."

Stürmer said the Audi system mimics the development approach at Toyota, which retains many parts in successor models.

"In Germany, most car companies don't keep parts from one generation to the next," he said. "This is the opposite."

VW has been here before. In 2000, former VW group CEO Ferdinand Piëch announced a policy to move from common platforms to common modules with the aim of providing clearer identities for the group's numerous brands.

But Stürmer said VW group shared across segments among different brands, such as the Golf and Audi A3, but did not develop modules across the entire car lineup the way Audi currently operates.

From Automotive news Europe (A Crain publication)