German auto giant Daimler has announced a new plan to invest €70 billion ($85 billion) in “research and development and in property, plant and equipment” between 2021 and 2025, the lion’s share of which will be used “to accelerate the transformation towards electrification and digitization.”

Most of this investment will be at Mercedes-Benz Cars, but some will used for Daimler Trucks to accelerate its plans for emissions-free transportation. Daimler also plans to set up a “transformation fund” designed to safeguard employment during the transition to EVs.

“With the Supervisory Board’s confidence in our strategic course, we will be able to invest more than €70 billion over the next five years,” said Daimler Chairman of the Board Ola Källenius. “We want to push ahead faster in particular with electrification and digitization. In addition, we have agreed with the Works Council [a group that represents employees] on a transformation fund.”

“After controversial discussions in recent weeks, we have achieved that, in addition to the Daimler investment plan, a transformation fund of €1 billion is to be established,” said Michael Brecht, Chairman of Daimler’s General Works Council. “In this way, we can mitigate the disruption of the transformation and send an important signal to our colleagues. The additional funding gives us more opportunities to implement new technologies and products in our plants, thus protecting jobs and know-how.”

Source: Daimler via Electrek