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1933: With many projects still in
development by companies to produce a small
cheep peoples car, Adolf Hitler declared his
intentions for s state sponsored Volkswagen
program, Hitler required a vehicle capable of
carrying two adults and three children at about
62mph, and would be priced the same as a small
motorcycle
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1934: June 22nd: Dr Ferdinand Porsche agrees to
create the peoples car for Adolf Hitler
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1936: Prototypes of the first car appeared,
the KdF-Wagen
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1937: May 28th: Gesellschaft zur Vorbereitung
des Deutschen Volkswagens mbH was established by
Deutsche Arbeitsfront
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1938: May 26th: Building of a new factory
beguine in the town of KdF-Stadt, called now
Wolfsburg, a town purposely built for the
factory workers
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1938: September 16th: Company renamed Volkswagenwerk GmbH
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1939: Start of the War with only a few cars
having bin made, and production changing to
military vehicles
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1945: April: A heavily bombed factory in KdF-Stadt was captured by the Americans, it was
then handed over to the British as it fell in to
their occupation zone, Oldham-born Hirst was
placed in control of the factories with the plan
for them to be used to maintain military
vehicles
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1945: September: Hirst demonstrated one of the
factories cars painted green to the British Army
headquarters, in need of light transport an
order of 20,000 was placed, the first few
hundred cars were given to personnel in the
occupying forces and to the German Post Office
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1946:
Despite bomb damage with the roof and
windows, the factory was producing 1,000
cars a month, the town and is car were to
change their Second World War era names to
Volkswagen and respectively Wolfsburg, with
production increasing. The companies future
was unclear as it was to be dismantled and
shipped to Briton but it was famously
rejected by British, American and French
representatives. Allied dismantling policy changed
although heavy industries carried on being
dismantled till 1951
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1947: March: Herbert Hoover stated "There is the
illusion that the New Germany left after the
annexations can be reduced to a 'pastoral
state'. It cannot be done unless we exterminate
or move 25,000,000 people out of it". This
helped change the policy and protect British
Army Major, Ivan Hirst Volkswagen to which it
became a part of Germanise economic recovery
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1948: Volkswagen became a very important element
in to Germanise regeneration, symbolically and
economically. Heinrich Nordhoff, an ex senior
manager of Opel was recruited to run the factory
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1949: Volkswagen reformed as a trust controlled
by the West German government, and the State of
Lower Saxony government, leading to Major Hirst
leaving the company. Volkswagens were shown in
the United states for the first time with only 2
sales that year
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1952: Volkswagen vehicles were seen in Canada
for the first time in their National Exhibition
and were accepted enthusiastically
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1952:
December: The first shipment of Volkswagens
reached Toronto
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1955: April: Volkswagen of America was formed to
help standardize sales and service in the United
States, resulting in the Volkswagen Beetle sales
increasing to 1 million that year. With sales
doing so well, a new factory was warranted, a 32
acre site on Scarboro's Golden Mile
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1961: Volkswagen expanded with the introduction
of the Type 3 models
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1964:
Volkswagen purchase Auto Union
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1968: Nordhoff believed and pursued the one
model policy till his death at this time, apart
from the Volkswagen Type 2 and the Karmann Ghia.
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1969: Volkswagen introduce the Type 4 models,
and purchase NSU Motorenwerke AG, Volkswagen
would ultimately merge Auto Union with NSU to
form Audi
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1971: Super Beetle added to the line up
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1972: February 17th: 15,007,034th Beetle was
made make Volkswagen the record holder for the
most produced, single make of car in history
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1973: The total number of Beetles produced was
well over 16 million by this time, however sales
in Europe and North American markets had rapidly
declined, they had a major problem trying to
replace such an icon, thankfully with the
ownership of Audi and their technology in front
wheel drive and water cooled engines, they came
up with the Polo, Golf and Passat
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1974: The Volkswagen Golf was introduced,
unknown to Volkswagen, this car would make them
fortunes
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1978: Volkswagen Rabbit production commenced in
North America, New Stanton, Pennsylvania
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1980's: Despite the success of the Golf models,
sales of Volkswagen's in the United States and
Canada fell dramatically, this was due to the
Japanese and American automakers producing a
competitive vehicle at a lower price
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1982: Volkswagen sign a cooperation agreement
with Spanish car maker SEAT
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1985: Golf GTI named car of the year by Motor
Trend, Volkswagen sales rose to break 200,00
that year but continued to fall the following
year
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1986: Carl Hahn purchases 75% shares in SEAT in
order to expand
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1988: July 14th: The New Stanton, Pennsylvania
factory closed as Chairman Carl Hahn decided to
expanded elsewhere
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1990: Carl Hahn of Volkswagen buys out SEAT
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1991: Launch of the third generation Golf
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1992: Third generation Golf becomes European Car
of the Year
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1994: J Mays designs and unveils Concept One, a
modern Volkswagen Beetle, VW management believed
it was too backward looking, but could not deny
the positive public response to the concept and
gave it the green light for development and
production
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1990's: Volkswagen acquires three luxury
brands, Lamborghini, Bentley and Bugatti
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2002: Bernd Pischetsrieder becomes Volkswagen
Group CEO
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2005: A loss of roughly $1 billion in operation
in the US and Canada due to a fall in sales
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2005: September: Porsche announce they will
increase there stake in Volkswagen to 20% from
5% at a cost of 3 billion euros, with the
intention of combining stakes of Porsche and the
government of Lower Saxony in order to ensure a
hostile takeover by a foreign investor was not
possible
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2006: Porsche increase their share hold in
Volkswagen to 25.1%. Volkswagen in the US and
Canada began marketing the Golf under the Rabbit
name again, Bernd Pischetsrieder announced his
resignation as CEO of Volkswagen. All
Golf's/Rabbits are manufactured in Wolfsburg,
Germany
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2007: February 13th: Advocate General Damaso
Ruiz-Jarabo Colomer announced a German ruling
that would prevent any shareholder in Volkswagen
gaining more than 20% of the total voting rights
in Porsche as the firm was illegally restricting
the flow of capital in Europe, this opened the
possibility for Volkswagen to be taken over, so
on the 26th March, Porsche took its holdings in
Volkswagen to 30.9%, Porsche then announced in a
press statement, they don't intend to take over
Volkswagen, but the move was to avoid a
competitor gaining a large stake in the company
and to stop hedge funds dismantling Volkswagen
October 22nd: European Court of Justice rules in
agreement with Ruiz-Jarabo and the law was
struck down
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2007: Worldwide Audi CEO Martin Winterkorn would
replace Bernd Pischetsrieder, the EOS, a new
hardtop convertible is manufactured in a new
facility in Portugal
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2008: July 15th: Volkswagen announce the
construction of an automobile assembly plant in
Chattanooga, Tennessee
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2008: October 26th: Porsche reveal its plans to
assume control over Volkswagen, from that day
they held 42.6% of Volkswagen's ordinary shares
and 31.5% in stock options, also Lower Saxony
owned 20.1% leaving only 5.8% of shares on the
market held by index funds
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2008: October 28th: Shares held by the index
funds could not legally be sold, the Hedge funds
desperate to cover their short position forced
stocks in Volkswagen to above one thousand euros
per share, making Volkswagen briefly the worlds
largest company by market capitalization
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2009: Volkswagen became the worlds largest car
manufacture overtaking Toyota
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2009: May 6th: Porsche and Volkswagen decided to
join together in a merger
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2009: August 13th: Volkswagen Aktiengesellschaft's Supervisory Board singe an
agreement to create an integrated automotive
group with Porsche but being led by Volkswagen.
The agreement was for Volkswagen to take 42%
stake in Porsche AG by the end of 2009, and
also, for the family shareholders to sell the
automobile trading business of Porsche Holding
Salzburg to Volkswagen
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2009: October: At a cost of 3.9 billion euros,
Volkswagen announced their percentage in Porsche
would be 49.9%
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2009:
December 9th: Suzuki and Volkswagen AG
conceive a common understanding and
establish a close long term strategic
partnership, Volkswagen's to purchase 19.9%
of Suzuki's issued shares
