Tariffs, progress ambitions led to new $4 billion plant in U.S.

DETROIT — Audi’s CEO defended the carmaker’s plans for a new $4 billion plant in Georgia on Sunday, calling it a enterprise choice geared toward rising gross sales and lowering publicity to U.S. tariffs.

The plant, set to be Audi’s first within the U.S., was introduced Saturday by President Donald Trump throughout a rally in Georgia, close to the place the Volkswagen-owned luxurious model plans to construct the brand new SUV-producing facility.

“We’ve got considerably higher ambitions for Audi in America,” Audi CEO Gernot Dollner mentioned throughout a media roundtable Sunday. “The USA is the second largest premium market on this planet, and at this time we aren’t totally exploiting this potential. We’re altering that.”

The announcement comes amid an intense restructuring of its VW dad or mum firm, together with plans to chop 50,000 jobs and shut 4 German vegetation, together with an Audi facility, between 2031 and ​2034.

Dollner, who joined Trump on the rally, mentioned the choice for a plant within the U.S. was years within the making, with greater than 70 areas evaluated over “many months” and “intense” negotiations with public officers.

“This isn’t a call towards Germany. Germany stays the spine of Audi,” Dollner mentioned. “We develop our automobiles right here. Our applied sciences are created right here, and Georgia doesn’t take any activity away from us in Germany.”

Dollner mentioned localized manufacturing is the perfect choice for the model, which has struggled in gross sales this decade amid rising operational prices and Trump’s tariffs on automobiles from Germany and different international locations into the U.S. Present tariffs on automobiles from Germany are 15%, down from 25%.

Final 12 months, U.S. tariffs price Audi 1.2 billion euros ($1.4 billion), because it imports all its automobiles for the U.S. market from Europe or Mexico.

Dollner mentioned the Trump administration requested Audi to announce the brand new plant on the Georgia rally selling Republicans forward of Nov. 3 midterm elections.

“It was … a three-year challenge that, on the finish, by coincidence, led to that second yesterday,” he mentioned Sunday. “With respect of the workplace and nation, we joined the invitation.”

Dollner famous Audi is the final main German luxurious model to determine U.S. manufacturing after Mercedes-Benz and BMW.

The corporate mentioned the Georgia plant is predicted to start manufacturing of Audi’s Q7, Q8 and Q9 within the early 2030s. The plant would have the capability to provide as much as 200,000 automobiles yearly, roughly half of which the automaker mentioned will likely be exported exterior the U.S.

“That is to make Audi clearly a major participant right here within the U.S. market,” mentioned Audi of America President Vito Paladino through the roundtable. He additionally mentioned extra particulars on U.S. investments and manufacturing are forthcoming.

Audi’s U.S. deliveries have been roughly flat via the third quarter of this 12 months, following a 16% decline from 2024 to 2025.