Volkswagen To Ramp Up Electric Car Production In China In Effort To Overtake Tesla

China is quickly becoming the battleground of the electric car industry. German carmaker Volkswagen plans to ramp up production of electric cars in the country to around 1 million by the end of 2022, Reuters reported citing company documents.

This would allow the German automaker to overtake Tesla altogether in the electric vehicles market. Volkswagen Group will roll out electric vehicle platforms to its Audi, Skoda and Seat and Porsche brands, and will be in a position to build 22 million electric cars by 2028, CNBC said. 11.6 million of these cars could come out of Chinese factories, VW said.

Volkswagen's plans to produce 600,000 electric vehicles next year from its two factories in China, according to the company's plans that have been previously reported. This huge number showcases the German carmaker's ability to industrialize production and leave companies like Tesla, which have a first-mover advantage in electric vehicles, eating dust. Tesla has a goal of making 500,000 cars a year.

According to Max Warburton, an analyst at Bernstein Research, “Making cars is hard. The move to electric vehicles will be expensive, but will probably be led by traditional manufacturers.”

Volkswagen has plans to retool its production plants across the globe to make electric cars by 2022. The German carmaker will fund its electrification push by increasing sales of its SUVs with combustion engines to 40 percent of overall sales by 2020, from 2.3 percent in 2018.