It's all about logging in. For most of us, this has long been the everyday life on smartphones: we are registered with large providers around the clock. We use the Apple assistant Siri before breakfast, download news from the App Store on the way to work, listen to podcasts via iTunes during our lunch break. Or communicate with friends via Facebook, buy clothes and furniture via integrated shops, use the Facebook ID to write comments on news pages. They are brand universes that embody a piece of home in the wild digital world. Something like ecosystems of data.

This is also the fundamental idea behind Volkswagen We. In the future scenario of mobility, the user is at the centre of every offer idea - and no longer the vehicle that you buy, put in a garage at night, occasionally drive into the car wash and bring to the TÜV every two years.

A vision with log-in principle
The vision: every customer will have a user ID that gives him digital access to the world of Volkswagen We. Some services can only be used with a Volkswagen, others also in cars of other manufacturers and for some services the customer does not need a car of his own at all. What they all have in common is the log-in principle, which enables to participate in all the mobility services that Volkswagen already offers or will roll out in the future.

These include, for example, We Share, Volkswagen's new car sharing offer, which was presented on 23 August: 1500 e-Golf and 500 e-up! will gradually be available from the second quarter of 2019, initially in Berlin. The first purely electric car sharing service in Germany - and the first product of the Volkswagen We brand that you can use even if you don't own a car.

"Our customers become part of an ecosystem," explains Jürgen Stackmann, Board Member for Sales of the Volkswagen brand. "It complements the Volkswagen experience on wheels and brings our customers' digital lifestyles into the car.

A wide range of services
What already exists at Volkswagen We today: Car-Net, the range of Volkswagen's mobile online services, whose spectrum ranges from navigation services with real-time information and special emergency call functions to practical control of vehicle functions via smartphone. And those who do not have a Car-Net can also connect their older vehicles with Volkswagen Connect and view important vehicle information via mobile phone.

In future, all these vehicle-related services will be bundled and constantly expanded under We Connect. And then there are the new services We Park, We Deliver and We Experience.

What is We Park? An app that turns the smartphone into a parking machine in public spaces. You start and stop the parking time via click, the app takes care of the billing of the fees. We Park is currently available in 25 German cities and should be available in more cities by the end of the year.