Fonds Sächsisches Staatsarchiv, 31050 - 31050 Auto Union AG, Chemnitz

212,96 (nur lfm)

History: Auto Union AG, Chemnitz was founded in 1932 as a merger of the Saxon vehicle and engine plants Audi Automobilwerke AG (Zwickau), Horchwerke AG (Zwickau), Wanderer-Werke AG (Siegmar-Schönau) and Zschopauer Motorenwerke J. S. Rasmussen AG (Zschopau). The production profile included the manufacture of automobiles, motorcycles and engines, such as the so-called "Volkswagen". Auto Union AG became internationally known through racing. During the Second World War, the company with its branches and plants was integrated into armaments production. Motor vehicles and armoured vehicles for the army, engines for the air force and torpedoes for the navy were the focus of the production programme. Numerous foreign workers, prisoners of war and concentration camp prisoners were also involved in this arms production. After the end of the war and dismantling by the Soviet occupying forces, the plants of Auto Union AG, Chemnitz were separated from the Saxon state administration on 3 October 1945 and handed over to the newly founded Sächsische Aufbau-Werk GmbH (SAW). The production facilities and assets received by Auto Union AG thus became an unencumbered and non-profit enterprise.<br /><br />Content: Supervisory Board meetings.- Foreign workers, prisoners of war and concentration camp prisoners.- Construction projects.- Operating manuals.- Balance sheets.- Dismantling.- Export.- Branches and plants.- Finance and assets - Research and development - Photos - Merger to form Auto Union AG, Chemnitz - General meetings - General meetings - Annual reports - Real estate - Trade - Inventories - Annual financial statements - Construction - War damage - Customer service - Site plans - Air defence - Fire protection - Patents - Personnel files A - Z - Posters - Pricing.- Legal.disputes.- Racing.- Reorganisation.and.handling.- Armament.production.- Statutes.and.statutes.- Statistics.- Tax.- Parts.lists.of.automobiles.and.motorcycles.as.well.as.engines.- Technical.drawings.- Subsidiaries.- Associations.and.clubs.- Insurance.- Advertising.- Suppliers.<br /><br />>Comprehensive introduction: 1st company history<br />>1.1. The predecessor companies (1899 - 1931)<br /><br />>Innovation readiness and diverse design advances helped the German automotive industry in its "pioneering years" from the end of the 19th century to the First World War to a leading position in international automotive engineering. In the prosperity phase from the turn of the century to the world war, it recorded steady growth in sales and dozens of new companies in spite of all the tax and infrastructural obstacles. Their backbone was initially formed by founding companies of design engineers who were enthusiastic about progress. However, the growth rates in automotive engineering increasingly led established companies in the mechanical engineering sector to set up their own automotive departments. The colourful variety of mostly medium-sized automobile manufacturers produced a wide range of model ranges. However, the innovations were largely limited to the design level. In terms of production processes, the small, financially weak enterprises remained at an "early industrial-craftsman" standard. In small series, complete automobiles were individually manufactured to order in the workshop system by the skilled workers, who were trained by hand, under largely self-made production of non-standard accessory parts. Productivity was therefore low and high unit costs, exacerbated by rigid vehicle tax legislation, resulted in selling prices that precluded a breakthrough to mass transit. The automobile was temporarily an exquisite luxury whose sales were limited to the wealthier middle and especially upper classes.<br /><br /> After the outbreak of the First World War, German automobile companies redirected their production and development to army vehicles and aircraft engines. They made still increased profits, however, in the civilian motor vehicle construction they lost now also technically the international connection. After the end of the war, with a few exceptions, the pre-war programmes were seamlessly resumed and structural change was renounced, for the time being through "customs walls"; protected from foreign competition. However, conditions on both the domestic and export markets had changed fundamentally. Domestic sales suffered in the wake of revolution, currency decline, lapsed war bonds, etc. from a noticeable thinning out of the traditional buyer classes for the luxury automobile. On the export market, the US competition, which had in the meantime switched to more cost-effective large-scale production, was faced. However, technical innovations in the type programs and, in particular, inflation-related currency and wage cost advantages still concealed the structural problems of the German automotive industry for the time being and even triggered an export boom. The currency reform of 1923/24 then put an abrupt end to this "illusory bloom". The high unit costs previously concealed by currency and labor cost advantages in small series production now had to be fully realized in the sales prices. Export sales slumped abruptly; even on the domestic market, imported cars, which were still cheaper despite high protective tariffs, recorded substantial gains in market share. In order to overcome the sales crisis of 1924/28, German automobile manufacturers made greater efforts to reproduce American production processes. Row and assembly line production replaced the workshop principle. In-house production was restricted to basic components such as chassis and engine. Functional and accessory parts were purchased from various suppliers and only assembled. However, modernisation also entailed considerable risks. The high cost expenditure exceeded the self-financing forces of medium-sized companies. Rationalisation had to be financed by loans if automobile production was not discontinued or switched to less competitive market segments in special vehicle construction. The industry became increasingly dependent on banks. In particular, it was found that costly capacity expansion did not in any way guarantee a corresponding increase in sales. The conditions for mass motorisation in Germany were extremely unfavourable. Transport policy relied on the railways. The long-distance road network was underdeveloped and motor vehicles were rigidly taxed as "Reich people's toys". More importantly, mass purchasing power remained loss-making as a result of losses in war bonds and inflation, as well as the more frequent economic slumps, while automotive customers continued to be limited to narrow upper classes.<br /><br />The costly rationalization was undisputedly a basic prerequisite for increased competitiveness on the domestic and foreign markets. Under the given market conditions, however, the cost advantages of the targeted mass production could not be realized. With a few exceptions, in particular Adam Opel AG and DKW, the German automotive industry increasingly focused its type programmes at the end of the 1920s on the less lucrative upper-middle-class and luxury car segment for foreign mass producers. In these market segments, predatory competition between domestic manufacturers, characterised by price reductions and constantly diversified type programmes, developed, which under the influence of the global economic crisis and the still intensified narrowness of the market soon took on ruinous forms. In order to save their investment and bridging loans, the banks, in agreement with the Reich Ministry of Economics, pushed for a reorganization of the German automotive industry. These basic patterns of rise and crisis in the young industrial sector are also reflected almost ideally in the corporate histories of the four most important Saxon automobile manufacturers of the first third of the century, the Horchwerke AG, Audi-Automobilwerke AG, Zschopauer Motorenwerke J., which merged in 1932 to form AUTO UNION AG, CHEMNITZ and Audi-Automobilwerke AG. S. Rasmussen AG and the automobile department of Wanderer-Werke AG.<br /><br />1.1.1. Horchwerke AG, Zwickau<br /><br />The most renowned Saxon automobile company at the end of the 1920s was Horchwerke AG. The automotive manufacturing tradition of the Zwickau "noble car body manufacturer" dates back to 1899. In November of this year, August Horch, previously a design engineer and operations manager at the Mannheim pioneering company Benz, founded

Saxon State Archives (Archivtektonik) >> 09. economy >> 09.09 Vehicle and engine construction

Es gilt die Sächsische Archivbenutzungsverordnung (SächsGVBl. Jg.2003, Bl.-Nr. 4 S. 79)

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Original description: Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek

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