VW to start road tests for all vehicles emissions

Potsch said engineers should have persevered until they found a solution.

We won’t know the full extent of the damage the defeat devices and cheating has caused until well into 2016 as there is such a vast amount of engineering data Volkswagen needs to analyze and compile into a responsible and accurate report. More than 2,000 have been informed in writing that they can not delete any data in case it becomes relevant to the investigation.

Chief executive Matthias Mueller said drivers of recalled 1.2, 1.6 and 2.0-litre diesel cars “won’t be able to feel it” when their vehicles are refitted with software updates from March next year. “We have retested all of the cars we could, which involves a lot of engine and gearbox and brand and body style varieties”, he said.

– Off the hook on CO2 -VW was nevertheless afforded some welcome respite from its woes on Wednesday, when it said that allegations it had lied about the carbon emissions of some of its cars had proven to be unfounded. He said the company has suspended nine managers who were “possibly involved in the manipulations” and he pledged to assign emissions certification to independent auditors in the future. Some 450 experts are reviewing information equivalent to 50 million books.

Broken down geographically, Porsche sales rose by 10% in Europe in November; saw a one-percent increase in the Asia Pacific, Africa, and Middle East markets (+14% in China, though); and experienced a four-percent decline in the Americas (down five percent in the USA specifically).

He suggested that the company was not considering any cuts to fulltime jobs, but that it might have to shed some temporary workers.

VW also said it was planning to bring in a new corporate structure that would be in place across the group by early 2017.

According to Pötsch, Volkswagen’s finances are strong enough that the company does not have to consider selling any units to cope with the costs of the scandal.

Volkswagen has posted a loss of $1.9 billion in the third quarter of 2015 after taking a charge of $7.3 billion related to the cost of fixing the vehicles involved in the Dieselgate scandal.

The carbon issue threatened to expand a scandal over nitrogen oxide emissions from diesel vehicles in the Volkswagen Group.

At 1625 GMT, VW shares were up 2 percent ay 134.4 euros, still down on their pre-scandal level of about 162 euros, but up from October’s low of around 86 euros.

“Winning back trust is our top priority and our top challenge”, Hans Dieter Poetsch told a news conference at the German company’s headquarters in Wolfsburg.