BEIJING ¨C In late December 2019, managers at Volkswagen headquarters in Wolfsburg realized they might have a serious problem in China, the company¡¯s biggest market and ticket to its electric future.
Its flagship Passat sedan had fared badly in an unofficial safety test carried out by an insurance industry body which simulated a front-on driver¡¯s side collision, a test that¡¯s been widely used in the United States for around a decade.
The car was mangled. The crash-test video went viral, attracting millions of views and triggering a social media furor across China, where the German auto king¡¯s success is built on its reputation for superior quality and engineering.
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