Massive shake-up planned for popular small car: Next-gen Volkswagen Golf to benefit from Rivian partnership to battle electric cars such as the BYD Dolphin, MG4 and more

What does $9 billion buy you? If you’re Volkswagen, it gets you an all-new electric Golf.

The German giant recently formed a joint venture with US electric car brand Rivian for a cool US$5.8b ($9b). That sizeable chunk of change granted them access to Rivian’s top-notch electric car software and hardware, which is an area VW has been falling behind its competition.

Volkswagen boss, Thomas Schafer, recently told media the next-generation Mk 9 Golf small car will be one of the first to bear the fruits of this new partnership.

“We decided on how to do the software-defined vehicle. It will happen with Rivian, the joint venture, where we put the new electric electronics architecture together,” said Schafer.

“But we have also decided that we want to start this journey with a more iconic product. So we’ll start with the Golf.”

The results won’t be immediate, as Schafer said the Golf EV won’t break cover until 2029 to rival models like the BYD Dolphin and MG4. But it could signal the end of the ID.3, which was originally planned to arrive in Australia early in 2025, but isn’t currently in the local arm’s plans for next year.

Schafer called the next-gen Golf a “software-defined” vehicle, which is the new industry buzz word.

It effectively means the vehicle has switched from being primarily a mechanical instrument to a software powered device.

This means software forms the core of the vehicle and enhances nearly all features — from advanced safety tech, autonomous driving, over the air updates, connected to everything, detailed vehicle telematics and intuitive software-powered comfort items.

These features are easier to integrate into electric cars as they ditch many of the mechanical elements of petrol and diesel cars and the electric motors, battery management and transmission are all programmed rather than hardwired.

This focus has been one massive headache for Volkswagen, which has sunk lots of cash and man hours into developing its own software with not much return.

VW’s borrowed tech from Rivian will first debut in Porsche and Audi vehicles from 2027 before arriving in the Golf. Schafer didn’t name the vehicles that were due for the software focus.

Rivian could beat VW to the punch and launch its smaller R2 SUV with the same software before the VW Group installs it in a vehicle.

The R2 was previously slated for the UK, which opens the doors to an Australian arrival thanks to us being another advanced right-hand drive market.