BERLIN (Bloomberg) — Volkswagen AG plans to bring back the $85,000 Phaeton to the U.S., where the flagship sedan flopped and was withdrawn in 2006.

The Phaeton’s U.S. relaunch is part of the German carmaker’s aim of tripling its share of the world’s second-largest market by 2018.

“We have our eyes firmly set on the U.S. market,” Juergen Borrmann, director of Volkswagen’s plant in Dresden, Germany, where the Phaeton is built, said in an interview. The model for the U.S. will be completely redesigned and retooled, he said. Continue reading Volkswagen to bring back Phaeton to U.S. after flop

TRAVERSE CITY, Michigan — Volkswagen may build a small car or an SUV at its new U.S. plant in Tennessee, in addition to the mid-sized sedan that goes into production there next year.

VW is considering options for the plant’s second product even before it has begun building its first, Tom Loafman, the company’s purchasing director, said here last week at the CAR Management Briefing Seminars.

Loafman also said the plant’s large Chattanooga site is in the running for a new engine plant Volkswagen hopes to build in North America. The engine plant also could go to a separate greenfield site or to VW’s production complex in Puebla, Mexico, he said. Continue reading VW may add small car or SUV to U.S. plant

PRAGUE — Skoda may reach a new record in unit sales this year, CEO Reinhard Jung said.

“We believe that our newly reworked range of models will help us, together with new factories in growing markets,” Jung told a news conference Monday.

“Maybe in 2010 we may add another record in the number of sold cars,” he said. Continue reading Skoda says it may see record car sales in 2010