VW is slowly vanishing from US markets (EV or ICE) and tried to enter the Chinese market only to get the crap kicked out of it
I'd mention Stellantis which is also mostly an EU company now, but they are so screwed at this point it isn't even sporting
That's a massive rewriting of history.
VW was one of the earliest foreign automotive manufacturers to enter the Chinese market.
In the 1990s and 2000s, the Volkswagen Jetta was China's Model T. And until 2023, VW was the top selling car brand in China.
And that was the crux of the issue - VW grew complacent by leveraging "Made in Germany" branding to sell in China, while not investing in innovation.
This meant that when Chinese challenger brands like BYD could outcompete VW in China, VW as a whole suffered.
Already VW has lost significant market share in the US after the emissions scandal and is functionally non-existent in Japan, Korea, Brazil, and India.
China was their last growth market within which they held dominance, and they lost it.
This is a common story for "Made in Germany" - German manufacturers strategically chose China in the 2000s for greenfield FDI, and unlike most other European countries, Germany's economy is extremely coupled with China (France and the UK were more diversified with France leveraging LatAm and India and the UK leveraging NA and India).
The persona that purchased VW cars in America was also the same persona that tended to care about the environment.
[0] - https://money.cnn.com/galleries/2010/autos/1001/gallery.gree...
[1] - https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1037084_driven-2010-vol...
Designed in Germany, almost all VWs sold in China (including black Audis government officials loved) were made in China under three 49/51 JVs (with VW as the minority owner). The majority owners in tern graduated with VW technology/know-how and combined with EV tech to sell under their own brands, although not as successful as BYD. Even BYD had its own 49/51 JV with Mercedes for a decade.
The only foreign auto manufacturer allowed to operate in China outside of a minority JV is Tesla.
That's a very important point I forgot to add! Thanks for bringing that up!