FRANKFURT — Volkswagen Group is looking into potentially carving out its Lamborghini supercar and Ducati motorbike brands, as the automaker seeks to streamline its operations and focus on mass-producing electric cars.
“We are working on our Italian legal structure,” CEO Herbert Diess said, referring to Lamborghini, Ducati and design studio Italdesign.
Lamborghini, Ducati and Italdesign will be folded into a structure that would allow VW to act if a decision is made to change ownership, Diess said on Monday in a presentation to analysts.
“We are, let’s say, bringing it into a legal structure where we could act,” Diess said, adding that no decisions on divestments have been made. “It’s probably a bit of a slower process,” he said, but “it’s on our agenda.”
Two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters last month that VW was drawing up plans for a potential spin-off or initial public offering of the brands.
Chief Financial Officer Frank Witter said that efforts to streamline VW’s sprawling conglomerate structure constitute a “work in progress.” Neither of the executives specified a time frame for potential decisions.
The executives were speaking after VW Group said on Friday it would increase its planned investment in digital and electric vehicle technologies to 73 billion euros ($86 billion) over the next five years.
Diess said on Monday that VW would miss its European Union CO2 compliance target this year by “a gram or so.”
He saw business recovering next year, with the company planning for a return to pre-COVID crisis levels in 2022.
Bloomberg contributed to this report