DÜSSELDORF (dpa-AFX) - "Handelsblatt" on German carmakers:
"Already today, vehicles from Volkswagen, Mercedes, or BMW are considered no longer competitive by a large part of the urban population in China. They were built through the lens of a roughly 50-year-old German engineer—for buyers who, in Germany, typically purchase their first new car also around the age of 50. In China, the typical new car buyer is in their mid-30s. (.) The key purchasing criteria are automated driving, software, connectivity, and digital user experience. These are areas in which German manufacturers have long been only partially convincing—even if they are now catching up. Germany's carmakers regarded China for too long as a market that admired and copied German engineering. In reality, China never wanted to just catch up—but to overtake. The state supported and financed this ambition, and the industry delivered. The result is now evident in crumbling market shares."/yyzz/DP/nas
