Volkswagen Group Components - Brunswick (Braunschweig) plant

Plant

The Brunswick plant is considered to be the oldest of all Volkswagen AG plants. Today, it stands for high technical competence and is one of the world's leading manufacturers of chassis components. Since 2019, the Brunswick plant has been a part of Volkswagen Group Components, an independent business unit within the Group's Technology Division under the umbrella of the Volkswagen AG, responsible for the production of strategic components for the Group’s vehicle producing brands. Since 2013, battery technology has been a part of the product portfolio. The Volkswagen e-up! was the first vehicle to be successfully launched in series production with battery systems from Brunswick. Now, the Brunswick plant produces the battery systems for a wide range of battery-electric and hybrid vehicles. The plant has also been manufacturing the batteries for the Group’s new MEB-vehicles since 2019. With that, the site has been given a central role in Volkswagens e-mobility strategy.

The total area of the Brunswick site covers around 682,000 square meters. In addition to three plants in Brunswick, further axle production plants in Isenbüttel, Emden, Osnabrück, Meerane and Barsinghausen as well as a logistics center in Harvesse belong to Volkswagen Group Components Brunswick.

Production

The component production includes front and rear axles, steering systems, and battery systems as well as machinery, equipment, tools, and molds. In 2022, 2.3 million axles, 9.4 million brake discs, 2.1 million steering units, and roughly 300,000 battery systems were produced.

The site is systematically geared towards e-mobility. Among the customers are the vehicle-building plants of Volkswagen Passenger Cars, Audi, ŠKODA, SEAT, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles as well as MAN, Scania, Lamborghini, and Bentley.

Management

Martin Schmuck is head of the Brunswick plant. He has been with the Volkswagen Group since 1996. Throughout his career, he has become familiar with the entire product development process. Starting in development at the Brunswick plant, he passed through further stations in planning, production and logistics. In his last position, he was leading the chassis component plant of Volkswagen Group Components in Wolfsburg.

Environment

The Brunswick plant is taking ecological responsibility. Efficient use and protection of natural resources are the key approaches of environmental protection. An important goal is the reduction of the five key figures (energy, water, waste, CO₂, and solvent emissions) by 45% per produced vehicle by 2025, starting from the base year 2010.

The Brunswick site fulfills the requirements of ISO 14001:2015 (environmental management systems) as well as ISO 50001:2018 (energy management systems). The efficacy of the environmental and energy compliance systems is regularly being reviewed and verified by independent certifiers.