In 1886, we started a legendary journey with the first-ever automobile. Today, we're on the path to our ambition: creating the most desirable cars in a more sustainable way for the tomorrow. And show the logo, please. A more sustainable way, what does that even mean? Guys, logo. Is it still running? Guys? It means—wait, what? CO2 reduced steel. Okay. Green, green what? Oh, hang on, I'm—oh, well. 1.6 million, that's, that's a lot. A circular economy—yeah, economy isn't really my thing, so. Oh, yeah, like bottles, like plastic. Batteries. So you recycle batteries, okay. Yeah, a circular economy, I—yeah, I get it. Electric portfolio. Can I see it again? Renewable. I missed that. Okay, so it's not just about cars. Okay. Keep it up, guys. So no car? Okay. Smart. And cut. Logo.
Hello everybody, and welcome to the 2024 Mercedes-Benz ESG Conference. It's now some five years ago that we introduced our Ambition 2039, which is our ambition to become net carbon-neutral by the end of next decade, and which is also the foundation that underpins our business strategy. Today, we want to give you an update on what have we achieved so far, but more importantly, what are we doing, what are our plans, and what are we implementing in the next years. We realize that the world has its challenges in terms of the macroenvironment, but we don't think that is a reason to let up on our efforts to decarbonize, and that is what we're going to go through with you this afternoon. I want to start with this picture. Last year, Germany reduced its CO2 by 10%. I think that's a very encouraging number.
It's the fastest reduction since the 1990s. And what I believe that this number demonstrates is that it can be done. So if anything, statistics like this is an encouragement for us to try to go faster. And when talking about going faster, I found a picture of this car in our archives. For those of you who are automobile connoisseurs, you know that this is a research car from the 1970s from Mercedes-Benz. It's called the C 111. So what were the engineers up to 45 years ago or 50 years ago when they were working on this project? Already back then, they were looking at new and revolutionary technologies for powertrain, but also for aerodynamics.
I think this is the spirit that we have always had in this company, to push the technical boundaries and see what we can do to make the product not just safer, but also cleaner and more sustainable. Coming back to the target, Ambition 2039 is, of course, about decarbonization. It's not the only thing that is essential to our Sustainable Business Strategy , but I think it's the first topic everybody talks about and the first priority. We want to achieve a net carbon-neutral position by the end of the next decade. In order not to wait for that to happen in 15, 16 years, we have also set ourselves an interim target by the end of this decade and achieve up to 50% of that journey by 2030.
Today, we're going to show you numbers, how much have we done so far, and what are the actions that we're taking to make sure that this happens on the way to 2039. Yes, we realize that market conditions, customer adoption, and different factors, buildup of charging infrastructure, etc., will influence this path and that this is a very, very ambitious and fast path. But what we're doing as a company is that we're putting all the building blocks in place to be able to achieve these goals and also the interim goals, as we will demonstrate to you today. Last year, we had dynamic growth of our battery electric vehicles. In general, for our complete fleet, we achieved about a 20% share of xEVs throughout our whole portfolio.
Yes, we have introduced a first generation of attractive battery electric vehicles that we, in the meantime, now have rolled out in pretty much every market around the world. We're going to continue. This year, for instance, one of our iconic vehicles, the Electric G, is coming to market. Many people may think G-Wagon, the ultimate off-roader, and going electric, does that even fit together? I can say resoundingly, yes. I had the chance to not only take this car on extreme off-roading in the mountains in Austria, but most recently in my home country, in Sweden, on frozen lakes to see the driving dynamics of that car. If we can do it with the G, I think that's proof that it can be done with any and every vehicle.
To grow that xEV share, we want to up that to up to 50% in the second half of this decade. Of course, that is strongly linked to our product portfolio strategy, our technology strategy, but all the other enabling factors in and around it to make sure that the customers can make that leap into a battery electric future. We know and understand that there is a big discussion and big debate in many markets. Well, how fast is this going to happen? What about the charging infrastructure? It's going to be available everywhere. What about policymaking? Incentives being given to customers, but also being taken away in some markets, creating some uncertainty in the eyes of the customer, going from the early adopter phase to now the mass adoption of electric mobility.
There are many questions out there, and many of them, it's difficult to get an absolute clear answer of what will happen when. But let me make one thing absolutely clear as far as Mercedes-Benz is concerned. The destination of this journey is zero emission. And that is what Ambition 2039 is all about. We want to be one of the companies that drive this forward. Of course, we are an established manufacturer. We have an industrial system already in place for electrified high-tech combustion vehicles. As customers around the world make their choice, more and more of them moving to BEV, but many of them still in that high-tech ICE world, we have the tactical flexibility and will be able to, well into the 2030s, offer the customer's choice. But this choice does not change the strategic clarity that zero emission is the destination that we're going to.
What does that mean? How can you, as a company, show a vote of confidence for direction? Well, ultimately, it is where do you put your capital and where do you allocate your engineering resources? And we are in the next years spending tens of billions of EUR developing new technology, new innovative technology, both on the powertrain side, but also on the digital experience side in several architectures to cater to customer needs in the Mercedes-Benz portfolio from top to bottom. On this chart, you see an example. This is a concept car, the Concept CLA that we showed at the International Auto Show in Munich last fall. You could call it the entry point into the world of Mercedes. And it has some spectacular performance targets: 750 km range, 12 kWh per 100 km fuel energy consumption.
For those of you who have not made the calculation or switching calculation yet and you're still with a combustion car, that's equivalent to about 1 liter car on 100 km, which is a sensational, sensational efficiency. Up to 400 km charging in 15 minutes, which means that charging comes close to fueling. And it's not something that maybe prevents you from jumping from an ICE car today to BEV tomorrow. So we are developing technology for our second generation product that makes this choice even easier. We believe in this future, and we're putting our money where our mouth is. And this is just the first vehicle that we will launch next year in 2025. So it's close. After that, a whole family of vehicles, 2025, 2026, 2027, 2028, will follow with these technological underpinnings that we are developing right now.
In today's paradigm, and I think we're talking about the systemic shift here, it's not just that we're switching from one type of product to another type of product. It is the whole transportation system that needs a reboot and a new buildup. Whereas we don't own or build petrol stations today, we don't need to. All of that exists. That infrastructure is available. We think that we should, as a manufacturer, send a signal to our customers, a vote of confidence for our products, and tell them we have your back by also investing into charging infrastructure. And whether it is as part of a consortium together with other companies or our own high-performance charging network that we're building up in relevant markets around the world, also here, we are investing sizable amounts of money to create this change on the path towards zero emission.
I could continue talking about the product all day. Of course, we're a product company. We love technology, and we eat, sleep, and drink cars. That's all we do every day. Let's not forget that Ambition 2039 is a holistic approach to sustainability. It's not just about the obvious thing, how do you turn the product itself zero emission? It's about the supply base. It's about your own operations. It is about the car in use. How do you put all of those pieces together so that the whole scope of the task puts us on a trajectory to net carbon neutrality? In production, we have made tremendous, tremendous progress over the last years. We're working with our suppliers. We are working with our retailers around the world to put together plans, how they can follow us on Ambition 2039 and decarbonize their business.
Already today, 47% of the energy that we are procuring for our own operated Mercedes-Benz Cars plants come from a renewable source. That's already a sizable number. We want to take that number higher by the end of this decade, take it to 70%. And here again, investing and showing that we're taking this very seriously, we are also investing into direct energy sources for our operations and different production sites through wind projects and solar. You will hear more about that later. So investing outside our own industry, but creating the enabling factors for decarbonization.
Speaking about partners, whereas having transparency on your supply chains, it's always been important, the focus on creating this transparency and understanding where do your raw materials come from, not just what you're buying directly from your supply partner on a tier one level, but following that chain all the way down to the source or the mine for raw materials. Systematically, we are going through our supply chains to create that transparency and know what our sourcing looks like so that we have a clear understanding of the fingerprint of every Mercedes that we build. We have also made good progress on this over the last 12 months. Next to CO2, decarbonization, maybe the biggest of all of the tasks. It's not the only task that we need to pay attention to when we talk about the Sustainable Business Strategy and a sustainable economy.
The other side of that coin is resource preservation, circular economy, and looking at every single part that we use when we build our cars. Where can we use secondary materials that have been recycled? Where do we need new materials? And also here, for the end of the decade, we have set ourselves a very ambitious target to try to reach 40% secondary materials in production of new vehicles. What would that mean? That would mean that even if we grow our business, we could gradually kind of decouple growth, economic growth, and the growth of our business from the growth of using primary and newly mined materials. So another extremely important aspect of our Sustainable Business Strategy . But it goes beyond the ecological side of things. We live in a digital world. Everybody has a smartphone, and we interact with the world through these digital interfaces.
Data and the use of data is one of the most important things that is changing our lives. If you add artificial intelligence to that, it opens a window to a wealth of opportunity. This is tremendous for the customers of Mercedes-Benz. It's going to make their lives and their drive safer, more convenient, more interesting. But at the same time, you also have to think about what are the principles that you use as a company when you work with the customer's data? How do you act in the interest of the customer? How do you make sure that the customers can trust that what you are doing is in their best interest? How do you deal with privacy? We're one of the companies that have given ourselves some rules when we use digital assets or use new artificial intelligence technologies to develop our products.
So we are mindful about this development, which happens really at lightning speed. These efforts are being more and more recognized by the different institutions that are watching ESG and try to, as best possible, rate the companies on the one hand, achievements and efforts, but also our intent and where we're going. And as you can see from this chart, the efforts that really started with that first announcement of Ambition 2039, those efforts are beginning to get recognized. Is this a reason to lean back and be complacent? Not at all. Not at all. If anything, it is an encouragement to actually try to do more and go faster. I've talked a lot about technology. I've talked about systemic shifts, about infrastructure, the enabling factors that we need to put in place to make this happen.
But none of this happens if we don't put the transformation of our workforce and our people at the center of the task. We have more than 160,000 colleagues around the world that are working with passion for Mercedes-Benz. With employee service, we ask them. We're in constant dialogue with them, not just through the employee survey, but it's an important tool. When 86% of these more than 160,000 people choose to give you a direct feedback, you get a very, very relevant and clear answer: where are you good, where are your strengths, and where do you need to improve? So investing in the human capital is also a crucial piece of the puzzle of this sustainable strategy. At the end here, coming to where I started, yes, we're innovators. Yes, Gottlieb Daimler and Carl Benz were the original inventors of the automobile.
Yes, we're now in a transformation where we are, frankly speaking, reinventing the original invention. That's the attitude that we take. Here is a picture of another research car. I showed you the C 111 at the beginning of my presentation. This car is called the EQXX. We have used this car for the last couple of years to break records. This is a recent drive in the Arabian Desert. They drove more than 1,000 km on one charge, and there was more than 300 km left in the battery.
That is phenomenal. To make sure that this doesn't just stay a science project to prove what maybe could be done and make it more tangible, many of the technologies that are in that research vehicle, you will actually see in series production already next year with that CLA, Concept CLA that I showed before. That is our ambition: use technology, use innovation to take the next step into the future. And with that, I would like to hand over to Renata.
Thank you, Ola. My name is Renata Jungo Brüngger. I'm a member of the Board of Management and responsible for Integrity, Governance, and Sustainability. Corporate sustainability has come a long way with increasing regulation on the one hand and customer and market expectations on the other hand. Corporate sustainability has become an important strategic task for Mercedes-Benz management, as Ola just made very clear. Sustainability is both a compliance challenge and a competitive challenge. Its complexity increases every day. But we are not complaining. On the contrary, we see a lot of opportunity in this field for Mercedes-Benz. We are prepared for what is coming in terms of regulations, and we are committed to redefining top-end automotive as a sustainable experience.
We firmly believe that this is our path to success in the next decade or two. Mercedes-Benz is a trusted brand, historically for its engineering and safety, and nowadays also for ambitious decarbonization along the value chain, comprehensive human rights due diligence, and responsible handling of data. Our brand is our strongest asset, and investment in sustainability is an investment in our brand. We approach this strategic task from three main dimensions: organization, processes and systems, and corporate culture. Let me briefly outline these dimensions to give you a glimpse of how we manage sustainability at Mercedes-Benz. Regarding our organizational setup, the Supervisory Board established a coordinating role for sustainability in the Board of Management last year and asked me to take on this role as part of my governance function for the group. Consequently, my area was renamed from Integrity and Legal to Integrity, Governance, and Sustainability.
In this new role, it is my responsibility to coordinate and drive the sustainability management of the group in a systematic and consistent manner, involving all relevant departments and decision-makers in the company. The execution, of course, remains with each single board member. They and their teams are the experts for what can and must be done in their respective areas. For that reason, we defined dedicated sustainability tasks for each board area of responsibility as part of our business allocation plan. My fellow board members and I will present each department's priorities going forward in a few minutes. Within our leadership teams, we have also streamlined and refocused our internal sustainability governance to accelerate decision-making. The times when sustainability management was an added on activity to business management are long gone. Today, it requires state-of-the-art processes and systems and a systematic integration of sustainability in the core business.
Therefore, we continuously work on improving our sustainability management model, covering all aspects from strategy development to performance management to external reporting. Let's dive a little deeper, starting with strategy. In recent months, we reviewed our focus fields of actions to better reflect what matters most for Mercedes-Benz in the coming years. We did this on the basis of a comprehensive materiality analysis, taking into account internal and external views. It was a joint effort by our sustainability and corporate strategy colleagues. Going forward, the sustainable business strategy of Mercedes-Benz will focus on the following main topics: decarbonization, resource use and circularity, traffic safety, digital trust, people, and human rights. You will hear more on these aspects, especially on resource use and circularity, as well as digital trust, in the course of today's agenda.
Second, turning to performance management, we continue to firmly anchor relevant sustainability topics in our core processes. Not only have we integrated the most important sustainability KPIs in our Mercedes-Benz planning process, but we have also improved our sustainability performance management by defining meaningful steering KPIs, some of which we have also integrated in our executive remuneration plans. Third, we rely not only on ourselves and our own perception. We stay in constant exchange with relevant external stakeholders. This is a requirement for improving our sustainability management effectively and permanently. Our main format is the Mercedes-Benz Sustainability Dialogue, which we organized last year in Stuttgart, Beijing, Delhi, and Tuscaloosa. This year, we look forward to expanding to new locations. Another important source of feedback is our Advisory Board for Integrity and Sustainability .
In a minute, you will hear a statement by Johan Rockström, one of our advisors, who will reflect on upcoming challenges and his outside-in view on our efforts to tackle the most relevant sustainability challenges. So much for our organizational and process developments. For this to be successful, however, we need one thing above all: the right people with the right mindset. We believe that we can only be successful in the long term if we work with integrity. And our efforts will only be as good as the ethical behavior and the knowledge of the people who work on them. Let me illustrate this with four examples: how we provide our employees with the necessary frameworks and tools to shape a more sustainable future. First, our Integrity Code. It is our basic framework and clearly defines what we mean by integrity.
Second, we offer a wide range of online trainings. In 2023, we successfully rolled out the new integrity basic training by more than 123,000 employees. Third, we organize innovative formats so that our employees can discuss topics with a focus on integrity. Last November, we did a global '' Integrity meets ... YOU'' tour, which included 106 actions around the world in two weeks. Fourth, we include our employees in the sustainability discussion. Also, last November, for example, we invited our employees to join our first employee sustainability dialogue. With such measures, we want to integrate our employees into the active shaping of the transformation and, at the same time, bolster our corporate culture. But that's not all. In 2023, as part of our corporate citizenship program, we announced our donation to beVisioneers: The Mercedes-Benz Fellowship.
The program intends to support thousands of young innovators globally to bring their sustainable project ideas to life. The launch of beVisioneers offers additional opportunities to inspire our own Mercedes-Benz employees for corporate citizenship and sustainability. Our employees can participate in an impact mentor training, which prepares them to apply to be a mentor for beVisioneers. Ladies and gentlemen, with a few examples, I just described how we at Mercedes-Benz manage and drive forward the sustainable transformation of our business through organization, processes, and corporate culture. Today's agenda includes the most important fields of actions where my colleagues and I will provide proof points for what we have already achieved and what we are aiming to achieve in the future. We will kick it off with a short impulse statement by our advisory board member, Johan Rockström.
Then Markus, Jörg, and Franz will talk about our progress in decarbonization and sustainable products, charging and production and logistics. In the next part, Sabine and I will talk about our Sustainable People Plan and respecting human rights along the supply chain and discuss how that relates to the Just Transition of our business. Finally, Harald and I will reflect on how we build trust in the digital sphere and approach sustainable finance. Without further ado, let's start with Johan. I am looking forward to hearing his insights.
Dear Ola, dear Renata, thanks for inviting me to provide an impulse to this 2024 Mercedes-Benz ESG event. Scientifically, it's clear we're deeper into the climate crisis. Speed and scale are the only things that count today. The global carbon budget is down to 275 billion tons of carbon dioxide to have any chance of holding the 1.5 degrees Celsius limit of global mean surface temperature rise. This translates to global emission reductions of over 7% per year to cut emissions by half by 2030 and have a net zero world economy by 2050.
Despite that, we know that tipping points are coming closer. In 2023, we reached 1.48 of global mean surface temperature rise. Tipping points are, in the latest scientific assessment, likely to be crossed when we pass 1.5 degrees Celsius. And among these include the Greenland Ice Sheet, the West Antarctic Ice Sheet holding 10 meters sea level rise, but also abrupt thawing of permafrost in Siberia, loss of the Barents Sea ice, and loss of all the tropical coral reef systems.
This is the unacceptable risks we're facing if we do not turn around the global energy system really fast. We have already invoices coming from the Earth system. The 2023 invoice of climate impacts alone is in the order of $300 billion per year, and we know it's rising. Overshoot is inevitable during a period of decades in order to even hold the 1.5 line. We are in a position of urgency, but we're also in a position where we need to speed up the transition away from coal, oil, and gas. The challenge is, as we know, as you know better than anyone, that the markets for the EV transition are temporarily shaken by shortsighted policy backtracking. Mobility in general is part of a massive global urban transformation.
In such a transformation, moving away from one logic powering the global economy to a completely new sustainable zero-carbon logic, it's not surprising that there is, in such a grand shift, also potholes along the way. The challenge, though, as we know, when driving along shaky ground with bumps on the road, is to keep the eye on the goal, on the goal of a transition to a zero-carbon future. And remember, you have policy support here.
Even though we can rightly raise concerns over the slow pace of implementation, the Paris Agreement, the Glasgow Agreement, the Sharm El-Sheikh Agreement, and the latest COP28 in Dubai all mean that all countries in the world have agreed in legally binding terms to hold 1.5, align it with science, transition away from fossil fuels, accelerate this critical decade, reduce emissions by 45% by 2030 with funding on the table, truly addressing both loss and damage, adaptation, and funding. So overall, the world has agreed that we've turned a corner. So now is the time to acknowledge the fact that all evidence now suggests, both in terms of science but also in terms of policy support, that those who are able to stay on sustainability tracks are the winners in the technology, market, and profitability competition that we're in right now.
So for Mercedes, in this context, it is, in my view, really important to continue holding on to your Ambition 2039 and to continue to go beyond engine CO2 alone, the need, just as you're trying to do, to take a circular approach. It's not enough to just phase out the internal combustion engine to electric mobility, like Mercedes-Benz is trying to do, to also look at the entire cycle on steel, on plastics, on rare earth metals, on really taking the step towards a truly sustainable product and proving to the market that sustainable luxury is the pathway to highest quality. This also means that my advice, at least, is that you should, if you can, come out more in public to communicate the proof points how sustainability is speeding up the pathway to Mercedes-Benz success and profitability.
This is giving or can give confidence to the markets in the transition. So in summary, this is no longer a sideshow. ESG is the main show. It is here we distinguish between winners and losers in the global transition that we're in right now. It is a question of whether you're succeeding with ESG that determines the final outcome on success on the industry. So the future, in my assessment of Mercedes-Benz, is determined whether or not the company will succeed in the EV transition. This is the root of the challenge. This will, in the end, determine the outcome. Environment has become the make-it-or-break-it factor. Sustainability determines the future for the entire car industry. So therefore, I wish you good luck in this really important ESG gathering you're having today. Thank you.
Thank you, Johan Rockström. CO2 reduction along the value chain and circularity are two key elements we are working on. I'm looking forward to sharing our efforts with you in my presentation. My name is Markus Schäfer. I'm the Chief Technology Officer of Mercedes-Benz. At Mercedes-Benz, we are committed to decarbonization. We know that ESG principles enable long-term value creation. This includes minimizing risk and maximizing opportunities in sustainable business. But let me start with the key drivers of change. We put a stake in the ground with our Ambition 2039. We aim to make our fleet of new passenger cars net carbon neutral over the vehicle's entire lifecycle by 2039. We are pushing hard to go all electric in the future. We remain focused on our strategy and stay flexible in our tactics under highly dynamic conditions. BEV technology is accelerating, that's for sure.
Nevertheless, customers and markets are setting the pace of transformation. However, infrastructure is growing, and we expect this to aid BEV ramp-up. Rollout of our high-power charging network is one example. We have launched BEVs in every passenger car segment we serve, and now we have more than 10 all-electric models, from delightful entry vehicles to luxury saloons and SUVs. Mercedes-Benz Vans offers a fully electric model in each segment, and sales are ramping up. BEV car sales increased last year by 73% to more than 222,000 units. That's 11% of overall sales, 20% including plug-in hybrids. Our upcoming architectures will help us to accelerate that even further. At IAA 2023, we presented the Concept CLA Class based on our Mercedes-Benz Modular Architecture, MMA for short. We will launch the first vehicle based on MMA next year.
Following MMA, we will launch our new dedicated EV architectures: MB.EA for our core vehicles, AMG.EA for high-performance vehicles, and VAN.EA for private and commercial vans. These modular systems enable maximum efficiency in each model. Our R&D activities are central to this. Our Mercedes-Benz eCampus in the Untertürkheim will play a key role in shaping the transition. The eCampus is our group-wide center of electric drive expertise. We develop our innovative electric drives here and test them to production maturity. In future, we will cover all aspects of battery technology at the campus. That includes a small-scale production of battery cells. Our globally experienced teams will research the cell chemistries of the future and test new battery generations, taking advantage of our advanced in-house facilities. The eCampus is designed and built in line with our ESG principles.
So, for example, around 60% of the roof area is equipped with photovoltaic systems. We will inaugurate the eCampus this summer. I'd like to come back now to our Ambition 2039 and our commitment to net carbon-neutral. The clear focus is on avoiding carbon emissions along the entire supply chain. This includes the supply chain, production, and logistics, well to tank, tank to wheel, and end of life. By the end of this decade, we aim to reduce net carbon emissions per passenger car over the lifecycle by up to 50% compared to 2020 levels. And we are making good progress. In 2020, lifecycle CO2 emissions per vehicle were 49.7 tons. In 2023, this was down to 46.3 tons. This will speed up significantly with the launch of our MMA platform.
It enables us to reduce the carbon footprint of the MMA fleet by well over 40% along the entire value chain compared with the previous entry platform. Reducing emissions through battery electric vehicles is the major step. But it's also important to decarbonize the supply chain and production. So let's take a closer look at our supply chain. Big levers here are steel, aluminum, polymers, and innovative materials. I'll start with the steel, where we are already taking advantage of opportunities. Using electric arc furnaces for processing steel is a great way to reduce carbon. In the USA, for instance, we have further increased the share of CO2-reduced steel processed using electricity from renewable sources. More than one-third of the steel used in the body shells of our cars produced in the USA is already sourced this way from big partners like Big River Steel, SDI, and Nucor.
Our aim by 2030 is to use CO2-reduced steel for more than a third of demands in our European press shops. Of course, we will also continue our efforts to introduce almost CO2-free steel. We are also making strong progress with aluminum. At least a third of the primary aluminum in our upcoming electric model generation will be produced using electricity from renewable sources. This is a big step, and it can lead to CO2 savings of around 40%-50%. The first model will enter into serious production already next year. We aim to extend this to all primary aluminum we source for our own foundry here in Mettingen. In addition, we continue to invest in new CO2-reduced alloys. Our target is 90% CO2 reduction compared to the European average for selected parts. Last year, we reached a first milestone when we brought a special alloy into serious production.
It comes from our partner Hydro and has a minimum of 25% post-consumer scrap content. Its carbon footprint is just 2.8 kg per kg of aluminum. We are also starting to specify the use of renewable electricity as a contract condition for our Tier 1 suppliers. Among others, this applies to aluminum and steel parts and begins with our new architecture by the end of the decade. All our work in R&D and procurement considers the circular economy from the very start. We call this design for circularity. The goal is to decouple primary resource consumptions from growth by keeping as many raw materials as possible in the cycle. We expect this to reduce our use of primary resources in our vehicle fleet by 40% by 2030 compared to a conventional approach.
Therefore, we are working to increase the share of secondary raw materials in our vehicles and further improve process efficiency. The aim is for our car fleet to have a recycled material content of 40% by 2030. Our recent advances in recycled polymers fall broadly into three areas. The first is a post-consumer recycled, or PCR for short. For instance, in the front and rear bumpers of our first MMA vehicle, we use nearly 7 kg of mechanical recyclate, which is a share of 35% of the entire bumper construction. There will be 25% PCR in the painted bumper trim. This is important because it fulfills our strict quality demands for painted exterior components. The second big development is in chemical recycling, which we are advancing with our partners BASF and Pyrum.
Crash absorbers in the S-Class and EQE SUV, as well as bow door handles in the S-Class and EQE models, are made from scrap tires. This is done according to the mass balance approach instead of raw fossil resources. The resulting product has exactly the same characteristics as virgin plastic produced from crude oil. And thirdly, we are exploring the further use of innovative UBQ material. This plastic substitute is made from household waste that usually ends up in landfill. This is already being used for cable ducting in our EQS and EQE. You can find out more about these developments in our 360-degree environmental checks verified by independent parties. Our latest check analysis: the environmental impact of the new E-Class. 175 components with a total weight of 99 kg can be manufactured in part from resource-conserving materials. One example is MICROCUT, a microfiber fabric.
It contains 45% recycled material and is used for interior cladding. Our Concept CLA Class also showcases sustainable materials. For instance, the floor mats are made from bamboo fiber, and some of the interior trim is made from an innovative paper material with a 50/50 composition of recycled cellulose and hemp targeted for series production. The polyester textile upholstery on the floating center armrest is made from recycled PET. We successfully developed our first elastomer components with 15% mechanically recycled content. This substitutes a large amount of natural rubber. We are currently preparing this for high-volume series production in the E-Class. We are also looking at several other circular technologies for components such as glass or brake pads. Biotech materials is another field with an important role to play in the future. In all of this, traceability and transparency are crucial for legal reasons and for our customers.
This means marker systems will become very important for the supply chain. Right now, we are looking into this for leather and plastic components. As I think you can see, a lot is happening. Now I'd like to turn to another part of the value chain: tank to wheel. Energy efficiency during the use phase is a key lever as it reduces the carbon footprint caused by driving and also enables longer range without increasing battery capacity. That's why we focus on making our vehicles energy efficient. A great example is our technology program Vision EQXX, the most efficient Mercedes we ever built. On its third long-distance road trip, over 1,000+ km, the Vision EQXX just demonstrated that even the Arabian Desert is not an obstacle to energy efficiency. The pioneering test vehicle delivered electric power consumption of 7.4 kWh per 100 km.
This equates to an equivalent of around 0.9 liters per 100 km for a petrol-fueled vehicle. With the MMA platform, we will transfer this efficiency into a comfortable series product. It contains technology from our Vision EQXX. We call the Concept CLA Class our Hypermiler for the electric age. Its energy consumption while driving is around 12 kWh per 100 km, with a remarkable range of more than 750 km in the WLTP. It's also very efficient when it comes to charging. It only takes 15 minutes for up to 400 km of range. With the MMA, we offer a glimpse into the future of EVs as a part of the electricity grid. Bidirectional charging holds new potential not only for customers but also energy providers as part of the energy transition.
When connected to an intelligent DC charging station, the car can serve as an energy supplier, either vehicle to home or vehicle to grid. For instance, with vehicle to home, it can supply the home during a power cut. With vehicle to grid, on the other hand, the car helps smooth out peaks and valleys in the energy grid. For example, it can store extra solar energy during the day, then feed it back into the grid at night. Bidirectional charging is one way we plan to fulfill the wish of many of our customers to combine their mobility with a more sustainable lifestyle. We intend to introduce bidirectional charging with the scope of the MMA platform. The use of bidirectional charging may be subject to market-specific conditions in respect of legislation and the requirements of energy suppliers.
The end of our value chain comes at the end of a vehicle's life. Our vision is to transform the entire value chain into the most closed-loop possible. That's why we develop a recycling concept for every new vehicle model. This involves analyzing all components and materials to assess their suitability for the different stages of recycling. We are increasing the share of recycled materials we use in our new vehicles. That means securing access to end-of-life materials, refining post-consumer scrap for new vehicles, and reintegrating high-quality recycled materials. Our holistic approach involves strategic partnerships along the value chain. One example is our plant cooperation with TSR and Novelis for recycled aluminum. This first-of-its-kind material uses an impressive 86% content of post-consumer recycled aluminum and reduces CO2 emissions by 73%. So, first press tests for prototype parts were successful.
Evaluation is ongoing, and we look forward to putting this into series production as soon as possible. Ladies and gentlemen, we have set up wide-ranging activities to reduce carbon along the entire value chain. Our goals are fixed in our contracts with our partners and suppliers. By 2030, we aim to have a recycled material content in our vehicles of 40%. We aim to reduce up to 50% of CO2 emissions per passenger car over the life cycle by the end of this decade compared to 2020 levels. Now, I would like to hand over to my colleague Franz, who will tell you more about our efforts with regards to charging. Thank you.
Thank you, Markus. Very valuable insights into our path to decarbonization and our sustainable products. If we want our customers to join us on the road to electric, we need to give them the correlating charging network. That's what we are talking about next: charging. I'm Steffen Hoffmann, and I head up Investor Relations and Treasury. I have a special guest here joining me. It's Franz Reiner, our Chairman of the Board of Management of Mercedes-Benz Mobility AG. One year ago, we bundled all of our business-linked charging activities within a new dedicated unit for setting up our Mercedes charging ecosystem, and this lies within Franz's area of responsibility. Franz, great to have you with us.
First of all, thank you, Steffen, for having me. It's really exciting to be here today. Yes, we firmly believe that electric mobility is going to support a sustainable and zero-emission future.
Great. So we've just heard from Markus how exciting it is to develop battery electric vehicles, how exciting it is to continue optimizing consumption-optimized vehicle technology. But obviously, building an electric vehicle and igniting the desire of our customers might be two different stories. So, Franz, what's the opportunities that MB Mobility can bring on the table?
Yeah, for us, it's definitely clear that we have to put the customer in the center of everything. And we need to make sure that they feel comfortable not just with the range of the product, also where they can charge. And what we need to do is we need to understand the target groups. It's the private customer, and it's also the commercial customer. That is exactly what we're tackling at the moment, and I'm totally excited about that.
Talking about infrastructure, we're working on full speed to implement a global infrastructure where our customers can enjoy charging wherever they go. And we're doing that with three initiatives. One, we are going to put up our own Mercedes-Benz charging infrastructure. Two, we're joining with other OEMs and joint ventures to span the infrastructure around the globe. And three, we're also putting the NACS port into our U.S. fleet to make sure that our customers can enjoy also the supercharger network.
That will definitely, in my opinion, contribute to an accessible charging infrastructure wherever our customers go. And it's a necessary step to make sure that our future is electric. But Steffen, it's not just about where our customers can charge. It's also about what our customers charge. And therefore, we're definitely also promoting the electricity coming from renewable energy. It's crucial because we also have to understand the lifecycle of the car and the CO2 emission footprint it's putting out. Based on our European mix, we know that around 50% of the CO2 emission and footprint stems from the charging exercise. That's why we definitely have green charging as a necessary step to CO2 neutrality.
G reat, Franz. Can you tell our viewers a little bit in more detail about green charging? How does it fit into our charging ecosystem?
Definitely. Green charging is a key aspect in our Mercedes me Charge world, which is, by the way, one of the largest aggregator platforms we have with more than 1.6 million charging points globally. And our customers are enjoying that every day, and it's growing also every day. With the green charging, we are definitely also already today promising, guaranteeing our customers that they can green charge in Europe, in Canada, and in the U.S. And if there is no electricity from renewable energy, we're putting up so-called energy attribute certificates.
And as of 2024, we already know that our energy will come from wind and solar plants. And the exciting part is they're less than six years old. So if possible, and that is also key for us, where we buy the certificates and where we redeem them should be also in the markets where our customers charge because we want to contribute to an expansion of renewable energy. So, Steffen, you see, green charging is in the midst of the Mercedes-B enz network.
Thanks so much, Franz. You mentioned that you have started the ramp-up of the proprietary charging hub. So how is it going? How is the roadmap going? Are you happy?
I'm totally excited, Steffen. I can tell you that the team is doing a fantastic job in the entire Mercedes-Benz organization. We announced in the beginning of 2023 that we will go for the Mercedes-Benz charging network. In Q4, we already opened their live charging stations in China, in North America, and in Europe. By today, we're operating already 23 charging hubs with more than 120 charging points. What is even more exciting, the team is really working hard to put 2,000 charging points up by the end of this year. Our aim is to have 10,000 by the end of the decade. So you see, our customers can rely on us that they will have convenient charging points and locations with practical amenities.
And what is even more exciting, we're offering that footprint also to our customers, which are driving other brands. But you can also be assured that our Mercedes-Benz customers will enjoy special benefits such as reservation functions. So you see, we're supporting electrification wherever we can because we truly believe in that. And one thing is also clear, we cannot just do it on our own. We're partnering up with organizations like, for example, MN8 , which is a renowned organization for renewable energy, that we can really give the promise to our customers that they're charging green.
So much on public charging. Can you elaborate a little bit on home charging? What should our viewers, as well as our customers, know about our approach to home charging?
Yeah, we know that our customers definitely, when they're traveling, rely on public charging. But to be honest with you, they also love home charging. That's why we're putting up an integrated service package to our customers, which is based on the network Mercedes-Benz Wallbox, which can go up to 22 kW, and we already have it in 30 markets. And Steffen, by the way, I'm one of the users, and I can tell you it's working, it's convenient, and it's easy to use. Plus, as Markus already mentioned, we're already working also on the future in terms of smart bidirectional charging solutions. So something which I'm also really excited about.
So public charging, home charging, there might be a missing piece for a certain part of our customers, which is kind of the commercial fleets, commercial fleet owners. How do we tackle them, and what can they expect from us?
Well, first of all, we're promoting that also in a very targeted manner because we know that fleets are definitely also leaving a huge carbon emission. And that's why we need to make sure that we also support our customers in transforming. How do we do that? We have a 360 approach where we partner up with organizations around the globe, and we already can offer today in selected markets for our commercial customer solutions. The way we do it, I would say, is quite simple. First, we consult with our customers to understand what kind of needs they have with their fleets, that they can also go full electric. Then we offer a wide range of products and services such as hardware installation and software.
As mentioned already, Mercedes me Charge is already well known in the private sector, and we're expanding that now to our business partners because we want to make charging as easy as it is on our private side. So we're ready to put the mobility, the electric mobility, up in a sustainable and zero-emission neutral way . We're ready for that, and the team is eager to get it done.
Thanks a lot, Franz, for that comforting message. So thanks a lot for giving us a better understanding of our charging ecosystem and our most recent progress and activities. And with that, please let me hand over to Jörg Burzer, who will provide us with some insights into how Mercedes-Benz is making its production operations and logistics increasingly more sustainable.
Thank you, Steffen. And hello, everybody. My name is Jörg Burzer, and I'm responsible for Production, Quality, and Supply Chain Management. After hearing from Markus about decarbonization and from Franz about our plan to offer the best charging experience in the industry for our customers, let's take a closer look at our progress in production and logistics of Mercedes-Benz. In 2023, we focused on cutting CO2 emissions through increased energy efficiency, producing more renewable energy at our own locations, and increasing our ability to store volatile renewable energy. This comes in addition to reducing the use of water and waste, and in addition to taking further steps on our way to sustainable logistics. In short, we are in execution mode. So how did we achieve this? Let me give you within the next minutes some more details regarding the mentioned topics. Once again, we are in execution mode.
We deliver what we announced in the last years. First topic, all our own Mercedes-Benz worldwide have been producing net carbon neutrally already since 2022. This is in large part because all our own plants obtain 100% green electricity. So the transformation toward a CO2-free energy supply is well underway. Since 2018, we cut our CO2 emissions by 72% for Scope 1 and 2. We have already reached our 2030 commitment to the Science Based Targets initiative. We are sticking to our goal, 80% CO2 reduction by 2030 and 100% reduction by 2039. The next main level for further reductions, decarbonization of our heat supply. This is much more challenging, more complex, and requires high investments. For example, we have decided to go for CO2-free heat supply in Kecskemét, Hungary, with power-to-heat and geothermal energy. Our next-generation paint shops will mainly run on green electricity instead of natural gas.
The preparations for the conversion of the paint shop at the Sindelfingen plant have already started. Second topic, our current status regarding renewable energy at Mercedes-Benz Cars, our road to 100%. 47% of our total energy came from renewable sources in 2023. We want to expand our green energy portfolio to achieve 70% in 2030 and 100% by 2039. So what about our energy efficiency? We decreased the consumption of our own Mercedes-Benz plants by approximately 10% per vehicle last year. In other words, we saved 290 GWh in total in 2023. We achieved this with the MO360 energy management system for efficient improvement in equipment and predictive maintenance. With the use of AI to optimize air supply in paint shops in Rastatt, we achieved 20% energy savings compared to classical control units. So let's take a deeper look into solar and wind.
Where do we stand, and what are our next steps? Regarding photovoltaic systems, in our production plants, we have already installed approximately 35 MW peak in total. By 2025, the photovoltaic capacity at the production and other sites worldwide is to be expanded by up to 140 MW peak, which corresponds to more than 1 million square meters of solar modules. We are actively promoting the application of green manufacturing concepts in our Chinese joint venture, BBAC, as well. The photovoltaic system at the Beijing plant is one of the largest ones within the global Mercedes-Benz production network. With approximately 90 MW peak, it is currently the biggest solar plant in Beijing, covering up to 20% of the local electricity demand by 2025. This is in addition to the 140 MW peak plant in our own plants.
Regarding wind, the approvals by the authorities for the wind park at our test track in Papenburg are well underway, and operations are planned to start already in 2026. 20 wind turbines with a capacity of around 120 MW are planned on our test track with one of the leading German energy park developers, UKA Group. This is one of the largest onshore wind farms that is currently being developed in Germany. Up to 20% of Mercedes-Benz Group AG's annual electricity demand in Germany could be met in this way. In addition, the expansion of PV systems in Papenburg is also planned. In the offshore sector, we signed in 2023 a power purchase agreement with the energy supplier, Iberdrola, for the supply of electricity from the Windanker wind farm in the Baltic Sea.
As a result, we could secure 140 MW of renewable electricity from 2027 onwards, covering around 30% of our electricity needs in Germany. With all that, Mercedes-Benz Group intends to cover more than 50% of its total electricity demand in Germany from new solar and wind power plants. In a nutshell, regarding renewable energy, we are doing our part, and we want to play an active role in shaping the energy transition. That's why we are taking energy storage to the next level. Why? To get the best balance between volatile renewable energy generation and electricity consumption. Here, we have two different approaches. One approach is to give our automotive lithium-ion batteries a second life and use them in stationary battery storage, as for example, in our Factory 56 in Sindelfingen. This storage has a capacity of 1.4 MWh. There is more to come, for example, in Tuscaloosa.
Another is a new partnership with the German clean tech startup, CMBlu, which developed a unique redox flow battery storage system. The advantage of CMBlu’s so-called SolidF low battery technology is their organic electrolytes. These batteries are recyclable, with a long service life, no critical raw materials, and ultra-scalable up to a gigawatt-hour range. Just last week, we signed a contract with CMBlu for a PILOT storage, and the ink hasn’t completely dried yet. The PILOT will be implemented at our Rastatt plant by 2025 with a capacity of around 11 MWh. It will be the first storage of this kind ever at our plants. In a next step, we plan to realize more battery storage systems at our locations. Mercedes-Benz is taking a holistic approach to the circular economy of battery systems, looking at three core topics: circular design, value retention, and closing the loop.
Because we have a clear goal to resource conservation, maximizing circular economy for all raw materials. Sustainable battery recycling is a key factor. We are closing the loop with our battery recycling factory in Kuppenheim, where we held a groundbreaking ceremony last year. For the first phase, the so-called front end is being ramped up. The second phase, the hydrometallurgical process, we plan to start in the second half of this year, subject to the outcome of the promising discussions with the public sector. The plant itself in Kuppenheim will operate net carbon-neutrally. Thanks to a new process, we aim for a recovery rate of more than 96%. The recovered materials will be fed back into the battery loop. Let me give you some further insights into our circularity approach regarding recycling material from production. We already have a recovery rate of approximately 99%.
This means approximately 87% of our waste will be green recycled. Further 8% will be downcycled, and less than 5% will be thermal recovered. So what do we mean by green recycling? For example, steel. To just follow up what Markus said before, thanks to scrap separation, we ensure that high-quality steel scrap is recycled to become new steel, approximately 35,000 tons in the last two years in Sindelfingen. Another example, aluminum. In Kuppenheim, we are sorting and recycling 100 tons per week of aluminum 5,000 and 6,000 series alloys. Thanks to this, CO2 savings from recycled aluminum are approximately 95% compared to a classic aluminum-based process. To make production more sustainable, we try to reduce and to cut water usage wherever it's possible. Our target is to save up to 35% of water by 2030 compared to 2018 levels. Let me give you several examples.
In Sindelfingen, we are now saving up to 350,000 cubic meters per year. Last year, we started a PILOT project with the cities of Sindelfingen and Böblingen, which we have now adapted for mainstream use in January. We see further potential in other plants, for example, in Tuscaloosa, Stuttgart, and Bremen, to save potentially more than 750,000 cubic meters of water per year with multi-reuse technology. Optimizing cooling towers in Tuscaloosa brings savings of approximately 100,000 cubic meters per year. Now, coming to logistics, our sustainability strategy focuses on CO2 avoidance and on the reduction of emissions for all modes of transport in inbound and outbound. To be honest, logistics and supply chain are challenging in regard to sustainability. Every action counts. What does it mean?
As part of our Ambition 2039 for Mercedes-Benz Cars, we aim to reduce CO2 emissions by 60% and to avoid fossil fuels in inbound and outbound logistics wherever operations are managed by Mercedes-Benz. We do this in close cooperation with our partners. Also here, we are in execution mode. Let me give you some examples regarding the different ways of transportation and current projects. Rail. Rail offers CO2-neutral transport with green electricity. We are already using this to transport battery systems from Stuttgart to Bremen, and we are extending this to our rail transport from our plant in Sebeș, Romania, to Bremen. Road. Electric trucks will start right now to transport from Stuttgart to Sindelfingen. In the US and Europe, we plan to use e-trucks for short and long-distance logistics. So stay tuned. Sea. We expand biofuels in inbound and outbound.
Currently, we save approximately 17,000 tons CO2 per year using biofuel on several routes with several partners. Further projects are planned. In 2027, we plan to start the next level of overseas transport with a futuristic-looking sailboat with Willem Spelten. So regarding carbon reduction and renewable energy, we are on the road to zero and on the road to 100% with our photovoltaic and wind projects. Regarding energy storage, we are harnessing the potential of renewable by massively investing in storage, starting with a PILOT in Rastatt together with our partner CMBlu. Regarding water management, we enable savings of up to 35% by 2030 compared to 2018 through multi-reuse projects, innovation, and promising pilots. Regarding circularity, we are closing the loop with our battery recycling factory in Kuppenheim. For the first phase, the so-called front end ramp-up is underway.
We are reducing waste and increasing recycling rates successfully across several key areas. Regarding green logistics, we have an ambitious 2039 target of minus 60% CO2 emission reduction through many-fold actions via rail, with e-trucks, and via sea for in- and outbound directly managed transport. I hope I could give you a good overview about all the many steps we are taking to improve our sustainability in production and to underscore that we remain in execution mode on this exciting journey to continuously reduce CO2 emissions at Mercedes-Benz operations. And now, let's go to our first Q&A session.
Thank you very much, Jörg. And now, ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to welcome you to the first of two Q&A sessions of our Mercedes ESG Conference 2024. For this Q&A session, we are very happy to have with us Ola Källenius, our CEO, Markus Schäfer, our CTO, responsible for development and procurement, Jörg Burzer, whom you've just heard, Member of the Board responsible for P roduction, Quality, and Supply Chain, and Franz Reiner, CEO of MB Mobility. Just the usual quick reminder ahead of the session, we'd like to politely ask you to focus your questions on the presentation topics we ju st heard. There's more to come. So we've just heard about decarbonization, sustainable products, charging, green production, and logistics.
In the second Q&A later on, you'll have ample opportunity to ask questions regarding the Sustainable People Plan , human rights along the supply chain, the Just Transition , Digital Trust, and Sustainable Financ e. So we are ready for your questions now. The operator will identify each caller by name. However, please also introduce yourself with the full name and the full name of the organization that you are representing before asking the question. The operator will now explain the procedure.
Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, at our customers' request, this conference will be recorded. If you want to ask a question, please press nine and the star key on your telephone keypad. To withdraw the question, please press nine and the star key again. Please ask your questions in English. As a matter of fairness, please limit the number of questions to a maximum of two to give everybody on this call the opportunity to ask questions. Moreover, I would like to remind you that this telephone conference is governed by the Safe Harbor wording that you'll find in our published results documents.
Please note that our presentations contain forward-looking statements that reflect management's current views with respect to future events. Such statements are subject to many risks and uncertainties. If the assumptions underlying any of these statements prove incorrect, then actual results may be materially different from those expressed or implied by such statements. Forward-looking statements speak only through the date on which they are made. May I now hand it over to Steffen?
Thanks a lot. And the first question goes to Stephen Reitman from Société Générale.
Yes. Good afternoon, and thank you for doing this presentation. You talked about the rate of BEV adoption being very closely watched and the sort of rate very much depends on customer acceptance. I'd like to look at the Chinese market in particular because it seems that there is something of a dichotomy there between very strong sales of BEVs but a relatively small share of that market going to premium vehicles like your ow n.
I believe that about 92% of all the vehicles sold in China are priced below RMB 300,000 , so say EUR 39,000. How do you see that market opportunity developing? Think you'll be able to price these BEVs at a premium like you do in Europe or the United States at the moment? Or do you think one has to bring the prices much closer to the ICE vehicles for much quicker? Thank you.
Stephen, thank you for joining this conference today. Yes, of course, we're looking at the BEV adoption in China very closely. You're absolutely right that the adoption in China has more happened bottom-up rather than top-down. What we think about our adoption rate in China, we have grown quite significantly in the last 24 months, albeit coming from a low level. And yes, products like the S-Class or the newly launched E-Class are very, very strong in the Chinese market, and the Chinese customers love those products.
So we foresee them to continue to be strong in the years to come. With this logic of it's coming from below rather from above, I think the launches of the products that we have in the pipeline 2025, 2026, 2027 is going to be crucial. On the one hand, the family that comes out of the MMA architecture. On the other hand, on MB.EA, where we then will launch the all-electric GLC and the all-electric C-Class, then we will get closer to where more of the action is. That doesn't mean that we will let up the effort on the top end.
In fact, we are giving the EQS a small makeover this year and an update both in terms of battery technology and many other things, also a new executive seating in the back and so on. So we're keeping all of our products fresh, but especially the MMA and MB.EA architecture, the way the market behaves now should give us further momentum in the years to come. With regard to pricing, what we have decided, but I don't think it's China-specific. It's more like around the world.
Yes, there is a variable cost delta between the battery electric vehicles and the ICE vehicles as we know it. Of course, I know you know this. We try to be sensible, realistic about the pricing differential that we can achieve between those two vehicle types and not overdo it and not just take the variable cost delta and tack it onto the price. That is why we're addressing our whole business system, as you know, in terms of all the cost categories to make sure that the overall financial equation works. Staying sensible with pricing, but according to our profitable growth strategy and our brand promise and where we position the products and gaining momentum with the MMA and the MB.EA architectures.
Thank you, Ola. Thank you. Thank you, Stephen, for your contribution. We continue with Marc Lavaud from ODDO BHF.
Yes. Thank you very much. Marc Lavaud , ESG analyst for ODDO BHF, have two questions. First, wanted you to give us a bit more color on why you abandoned your BEV sales target for 2030, why put them in place in 2021 and leave them behind only 2.5 years later. And second, wanted to know what was your official lobbying stance regarding the CO2 regulation. Are you lobbying for the removal of the EU 2035 ICE ban? And are you also possibly lobbying for the removal of the 2030 CO2 emission reduction target? Thank you very much.
When we defined, Marc, Ambition 2039, five years ago, of course, we set the ultimate target of CO2 neutrality by the end of the next decade. But we also said it should not be like a milestone. You start here and then you wait 20 years later until you measure the next time. So very early on, we said we will put the company in a position in terms of our product portfolio and our offering to go all-electric in markets where market conditions allow. So we haven't abandoned anything.
We are very much committed to that thrust into EVs. And in fact, we're investing EUR tens of billions into the new architectures that were in Markus' presentation, not just the new architectures, but also the technology that's underpinning the architectures. At the same time, the sentence, "Where market conditions allow," is exactly that. You got to watch and see what's happening. How quickly does the charging infrastructure build up? What does the incentive picture look like in different markets?
What is the sentiment of the customer when it comes to mass adoption now that the early adopter phase kind of is over and we're moving into a second stage of this adoption? We cannot ignore those market conditions. That is why in our recent annual results conference, we said we are an established manufacturer. We have all the assets and infrastructure developed for our high-tech electrified combustion engines. If market conditions don't allow our customers to decide to adopt later, we will be able to offer both well into the 2030s. That is not a lack of confidence in the electric strategy. Nothing could be farther from the truth. If we had thought that we would not do that, we would not do these investments. We are.
So we want to drive the market and look forward to launching these vehicles in 2025, 2026, 2027, and going forward. On the 2035, the ICE has said that we support 2035. When the target was set, it was also clear that there would be a review in 2026 to look at the KPIs. How far have we gotten? Is the charging infrastructure buildup progressing as needed, as expected? What does the adoption rate look like? And so on and so forth. So I think what we need to do is to wait for that 2026 review and just have a sober look at the data and then decide what to do. But back to our commitment, our investment strategy, we will have the full range of Mercedes products from top to bottom available for any and every market by the end of this decade.
Thank you, Ola. Thank you, Marc. We continue with Henry Mason from Morgan Stanley.
Yeah. Thank you very much for your time. Another two-part question from me. So one is, given the announced delay, the target for 50% xEV sales now at the end of the decade, are there any planned associated delays in further EV platform development or subsequent next-gen EV rollouts after the launch of the platform? And separately, does the previous target of all platform investments from 2025 being focused solely on BEVs still apply?
So to the first question, the short answer is no, Henry. We are full force ahead. I think Markus has made that quite clear. In terms of the electrified high-tech ICEs, you have to have a coherent offering in the showroom. If a customer goes into a Mercedes showroom and he looks at an electric product, but he also looks at the combustion product, they need to be, from a technological point of view, equal siblings in that showroom. So we're keeping those electrified combustion vehicles also at the top of the technology and at the forefront.
And we'll continue to do so as long as there is meaningful demand for that. But the good thing here is that especially investments that are going into, even if it's not the main topic of today, into the digital side of things, infotainment, driving assistance systems, and so on, we can apply those technologies across the product offering. It's not something that is just developed and only fits in the EV cars. That can be used in our combustion vehicles as well.
Thank you, Henry. And we continue with Kathleen Dewandeleer from Aberdeen. Kathleen, can you hear us? Kathleen, you might need to unmute yourself. As we cannot hear you at the moment, then we would continue with you, José Asumendi from JP Morgan.
Thank you very much. Two questions, please. It's José from JP Morgan. Can you talk, please, about the initiatives to reduce the carbon footprint in the paint shop? How quickly can you scale this across the group? Who are your key partners, and what kind of investments are we talking about when it comes to this initiative? And second, I'm very interested in the eCampus in Untertürkheim. Can you elaborate a little bit more on how does the campus look like? What are the key initiatives behind it?
Thank you. Yes. José, about the paint shops. So our first main project is in Sindelfingen, as I mentioned before. One of the key enablers is basically to use electricity also for heating up the paint shop. Our main partner is Dürr. So we announced that already, by the way, not only for Sindelfingen, but we're obviously working with them not only on the paint shop but on a lot of innovations on the paint shop side or on the paint side.
So that's very important because a lot of innovation is necessary to replace fossil energy carriers, basically generating the heat. So that's one of the main initiatives which we have. From an investment standpoint, we announced for Sindelfingen that we have a three-digit million EUR amount which we are spending here. So it's a pretty big approach. And if you visit Sindelfingen, you already see that it's in progress. So we are preparing the site, and we are on track with implementing and building up the paint shop. I don't know, the Kuppenheim topic? No, it's probably Untertürkheim.
So yeah. Yeah. I'll take that, José. The eCampus in Untertürkheim, maybe there are two ways to look at this eCampus here. It's a testimony of transformation. This is, Jörg, one of the biggest powertrain plants that Mercedes had in the past. And we're transforming this powertrain plant here. And we're putting a research and small-scale production facility here in this plant here, creating new jobs and reskilling people here. But from an R&D standpoint, even more important, addressing the research on batteries in many ways, finding new chemistries to cost down the batteries. So this is really, really a deep-dive research lab that we're building here. And I'm happy to show you guys around in a couple of weeks when we open here. So it's a small-scale production cell facility here. You'll be impressed.
So we have a one-to-one-scale facility here to produce cells here. So not only lab conditions that we're creating here, but one-to-one production conditions on the way to find new chemistries here for more energy density, but also very, very important for lowering the cost here. So research on cells, testing, and producing small-scale cells here in this facility. The second part of the eCampus is the e-drivetrain. And I mentioned efficiency is key. Efficiency is an enabler for generating smaller batteries, putting smaller batteries in the car, or providing longer range. So the e-drivetrain is the second focus in this facility where we further develop our in-house e-drive as a system, making it more efficient but also working on the cost side. Thank you very much. You can pause.
Thanks, Jörg. Thanks, Markus. And thanks, José, for being with us. From London, we go to Paris, Camille Barré from Mirova.
Yeah. From Mirova. Hi, Camille Barré from Mirova. Thank you very much for the presentation. I kind of wanted a little bit more of a focus on all of your Asian part. You have plants in China, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, India. You did discuss a little bit about what you're doing in terms of green logistics and everything in Europe and U.S. But it would be interesting to know what you're doing in terms of partnerships and circularity, even green logistics. What are the projects you're developing with Asia, which is a big footprint and is the hardest to decarbonize to this day?
Yeah. I can take that. Well, it's interesting to see how global photovoltaic systems are, I would say. So I just mentioned in my presentation with regards to China, that's the biggest photovoltaic array of modules which we have right now in our production plants. If you compare that, we want to have 140 MW peak in the rest of the world production network and 90 MW peak alone in China. So it's the biggest photovoltaic system which we have right now. And it's exciting to see how fast this is built up, built on the roof of one of our plants in China, in the north of Beijing. With regards to green logistics, we are obviously also rolling out the initiatives which we have in Europe. As I said, green logistics is one of the most challenging topics, I personally think, especially if you look to 2039.
We need to have more innovations in terms of technology, especially on the seaside, especially on inbound but also outbound because we have to decarbonize ship transport and the long-distance routes. This is extremely important if you look at China, Vietnam, and Malaysia, and India because a lot of parts are also transported from Europe to these locations, but also, on the other hand, back from these locations to Europe and/or U.S.
Thanks, Jörg. Thanks, Camille. We have time for two more questions during this session. We would continue with Joe Horrocks-Taylor from Columbia Threadneedle. Joe, please.
Hi. Good afternoon. Thank you for hosting this ESG conference again. I have two questions. In last month's capital markets presentation, Mercedes said it is aiming to drive down material costs in the coming years. How do you square efforts to drive down costs with the high ESG standards you set for suppliers and your ambitions to green your supply of key materials? The second question: Mercedes has been fairly cautious on entering battery mineral offtake agreements, a decision which could pay off in the short term given the drop in lithium and nickel prices. But do you have a target to direct source a certain percentage of battery raw materials through offtake agreements with miners?
Markus, would you take both of them?
W ell, the requirements when it comes to decarbonization and CO2 reduction and the use of a secondary raw material is now put into every spec book. So every engineer developing a new component has this kind of requirements. We are rethinking the car. We are rethinking the car in the future, doing new architectures, as we mentioned. MMA architecture, MB.EA architecture, the AMG.EA architecture. This gives us a room to rethink the body of the car, the entire architecture, and the modules of the car also in a cost perspective.
We have the freedom to work on cost and, at the same time, to implement deep down in every component our requirements for ESG here. Especially the new architectures offer this degree of freedom that we are extensively using here. Secondly, the sourcing strategy for battery raw materials, in many ways, we think about a local-for-local approach here. It was very China-dominant in the first place. But now, with opening our battery plant in the U.S., with entering in a battery joint venture with partners here in Europe and just about to finish the first battery cell plant here, we go in a more local-for-local, at least battery cell production approach.
The assembly approach, Joe, is already very global. We have the assembly plant in the U.S. We have it here in Europe. We have it in China. Now, the next step is the supply chain, as you said. So, as we said last year, we are striving for a local-for-local supply chain, especially in the light of, let's say, IRA, for example. We are entering some new agreements with our supply base in North America to have, let's say, a North America-focused supply chain, especially to comply with the IRA requirements here. We're working on building up a supply chain in the European or greater European setup with our new partner, ACC, for example, here. And, of course, we have our established, very transparent supply chain in China.
So I don't want to go in the contractual details, but we are very, very deeply following up what's happening in the supply chain all across the world for many, many reasons, environmental reasons, protecting human rights here, and, very important, to be resilient, to have a resilient supply in the future here. And these are the agreements that we have in place with our suppliers or we are about to do directly. We mention ed Rock Tech as one example in Canada, where we have some direct contracts, opened an office in Canada. So we are working more our way into the supply chain, not owning mines but controlling what's happening, controlling cost in the supply chain, making sure it's resilient and it's compliant with human rights and environmental aspects here.
Thank you, Markus. Thanks, Joe. And the last question in this round would go to Justin Kew from Balyasny.
Hi. My name is Justin Kew from Balyasny Asset Management. First of all, thank you so much for the presentation. It's really exciting to hear the electric G- Wagon is coming. So that's quite exciting. Two questions here. So first question will be on the Critical Raw Materials Act. So interested to hear the challenges from this particular act from a standpoint because I know you guys are doing a lot on this. So interested to hear that given the new regulations.
The second thing is your charging infrastructure strategy. Certainly, very exciting to see that. I want to hear a bit more in terms of what does it look like in the long term when Mercedes-Benz continues to launch a lot of charging infrastructure, or is it just a small part of just to give your consumer, your customers, that sort of comfort? Then, longer term, this may or may not be there. So interested to hear that. Thank you.
Charging. Okay. Charging. Franz, would you start with the charging?
Yes. So the charging is definitely what we're looking into a short and mid-term range to make sure, as I said, that we can have enough access to infrastructure and charging. We have three approaches, as mentioned. One is we're building up our own charging network. The second one, we're going into joint ventures. And we're definitely looking into that this is, for us, a profitable business down the road. On the other side, we truly believe that the charging network as such is a creation of assets in itself. So that's where we're looking into. And we first need to fulfill the customer experience, and then we will see how the future will go.
Thank you, Franz. Justin, I suggest the following on the Critical Raw Materials Act. This very much points to one of the topics that's very high on the agenda for Renata Jungo Brüngger. We have her in the second Q&A. I suggest that we start right away in the second Q&A with this topic. So just bear with us a very short time, and then we will give you the right answer. So far, thank you very much for the questions in this first round. As I said, there will be a second round. We'll now start with the second part of the ESG conference, comprising presentations and talks by Sabine Kohleisen, Renata Jungo Brüngger, and Harald Wilhelm. As we said, after the presentations, there will be time for a second Q&A on exactly those topics, starting with an S and with a G. Sabine, the stage is yours.
Hello, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Sabine Kohleisen. I'm Board Member at Mercedes-Benz, responsible for Human Relations and Labor Director. My colleagues explained how we want to achieve our goals of a net carbon-neutral mobility and production. Let's consider this the E of ESG. But it's not just our products and operations that are in transformation. It's also our people. That's why we at Mercedes-Benz not only focus on the E part of ESG but also on the S.
With our HR strategy, our Sustainable People Plan , we are shaping this transformation in a future-oriented, socially acceptable, and responsible manner. The current transformation is characterized by three central challenges for our whole industry and in human relations: the three Ds, decarbonization, demographic change, and digitalization. Decarbonization, we all know by now, the transition from combustion engines to electric drives has a significant impact on jobs and job profiles.
That applies, in particular, to our powertrain plants as there are fewer production steps in the value chain for battery electric vehicles than for combustion engines, always depending on the level of vertical integration, of course. Demographic change. The so-called baby boomers are reaching retirement age in this period. At Mercedes-Benz, 20% of our employees will leave us due to age in the next 10 years. While this is certainly an important lever for slimming down our workforce, it is also a challenge when it comes to skill management and knowledge transfer. Digitalization. It's no secret. Data and new AI applications, such as GenAI, are changing businesses tremendously and at incredible speed. They are also changing the way of working. While some job profiles are disappearing completely, new jobs emerge, and existing job profiles are changing at the same time. Thus, investment in new digital skills is crucial.
Let's sum it up. These three Ds are fundamentally changing the world of work in our industry over the coming years. At Mercedes-Benz, our answer is our Sustainable People Plan. At the core of our HR strategy are our so-called three Rs: Reshape, Reskill, and Recharge. With them, we are shaping our HR work and the transformation in a responsible, socially acceptable, and future-oriented manner to drive a Just Transitio n as an integral part of our sustainable business strategy. Furthermore, we empower our team for a digital and electric future while ensuring the competitiveness of our company and the necessary skilled workforce. Let's start with reshape. With reshape, we shape the entire company according to new requirements: lean, resilient, agile, and innovative. That results in constant reorganization of our company. However, there is no one-size-fits-all solution.
That is why we are organizing our plans, legal entities, and functions through individual target plans. For example, as I mentioned earlier, there are fewer production steps in the value chain for battery electric powertrain than for combustion engines. Consequently, there will be fewer people as well. Another example in this regard is our recent strategic decision to sell our own retail organization in Germany. However, when it comes to reshape, the premise is always a Just Transition for our teams. We will elaborate on that later in our talk on Just Transition. Simultaneously, we need more experts in some areas, and we are hiring for our future. One example is our own Mercedes-Benz Operating System, MBUX, or our R&D hub in China. Another example is our vocational training and dual study program. We train our own talent with a focus on future-oriented job profiles and skills.
In doing so, we are constantly challenging and revising our portfolio for vocational training and for the Cooperative State University in Germany. Starting this October, we will offer a dual study program on sustainable management in business. The study program teaches our youngest talents knowledge and methods to manage economic, ecological, and social values of our sustainable strategy. This leads me to another important aspect for our future success: reskill. With reskill, we drive innovation and continue to build our position of strength by equipping our team members with the necessary skills and mindsets. We identify the skills and abilities that will be needed in the future and develop our teams in these profiles. Furthermore, we establish a culture of lifelong learning and support our team members to continuously grow personally and professionally. Our current numbers show that we are well on our way to becoming a learning organization.
Within this decade, we plan to invest more than EUR 2 billion in our Turn 2 Learn qualification initiative to make learning a self-determined, independent, and as simple as possible. The number of total learning hours shows how highly motivated and committed our team is. In 2023 alone, they invested more than 2.3 million hours in learning. That is an increase of 19% compared to 2022. Let's look at two especially important future topics: electric mobility and digitalization. In 2023, 27,000 qualifications in Germany in topics related to electric mobility were completed. That's an increase of 36% compared to 2022. Earlier, I mentioned digitalization and its effect on the way we work. Data and new AI applications, such as Gen AI, are changing all job profiles. At Mercedes-Benz, we are on our way to turning those challenges into opportunities.
Worldwide, our employees took part in around 142,000 training courses on artificial intelligence and IT topics, such as software coding and cybersecurity. Furthermore, more than 600 employees underwent targeted training to become data and AI specialists in 2023. To enable the use of generative AI, we introduced our own internal Gen AI application at the end of 2023: Mercedes-Benz Direct Chat. Around 150,000 employees worldwide can use the tool today. At the same time, we leverage Gen AI tools and use cases supported by AI across all departments. For example, we are testing ChatGPT in our cars, in production, and in procurement to optimize data analysis and assess documents and information even faster. With our third R, recharge, we focus on driving the best people experience. We are dedicated to be the employer of choice for our team members and future talents.
We want to continuously improve our leadership and corporate culture and further develop it in the transformation process. To measure our progress, we conduct a comprehensive group-wide employee survey every two years, followed by a thorough analysis of the results and follow-up measures. The last survey was done in 2023 and is an important indicator of where our company stands on various topics from the viewpoint of our employees and where there is potential for improvement. Last year, 86% of all employees took part in the group-wide employee survey. This marks the highest-ever level of participation we have achieved in a group-wide employee survey at Mercedes-Benz. It shows our team's willingness to play an active role in shaping our corporate culture. Compared to 2021, this is an increase of 8%, driven mainly by a significantly higher participation in production and production-related areas.
The survey revealed that 77% of the employees surveyed are satisfied or very satisfied with the Mercedes-Benz Group as an employer. Additionally, there is meaningful improvement when it comes to engagement. Compared to the 2021 survey, we can observe an increase of 6 percentage points. That is especially important when it comes to our transformation, as engaged people are the true drivers of it. However, despite progress, there is still a need for action. To support our managers, we have provided them with a toolbox of information and work material, as well as training courses. One important factor that plays into satisfaction and engagement is a safe and healthy working environment, as well as good working conditions. The health and safety of our employees is a top priority. Our corporate healthcare management offers regular health checks, social counseling, and training in terms of sports, mindfulness, and healthy nutrition.
On paper, that's an investment of around EUR 6.2 million in the past year in Germany alone. At Mercedes-Benz, we offer an attractive package for our people. There are three things I would like to highlight. Firstly, Mercedes-Benz offers a variety of worktime options to foster full flexibility wherever possible. Secondly, we offer different local benefits to foster sustainable transportation. In Germany, for example, we subsidize the so-called Deutschlandticket and offer special conditions for bike leasing. And last but not least, we offer an attractive remuneration and benefit package. This year, for the first time, ESG targets will be anchored in all our bonuses in Germany, from tariff-scale employees to the Board of Management. The calculation logic used for tariff-scale employees is now in line with the existing system for managers.
This means the amount of profit-sharing bonus is now more closely aligned to the achievement of the company's financial targets and systematic implementation of the Sustainable Business Strategy. With this step, we highlight our comprehensive commitment to ESG-oriented governance. Change and transformation require different perspectives and creative ideas. But how do we create an environment in which the appropriate mentality and creativity are encouraged? Besides a modern and flexible working environment, this is exactly what diversity is needed for. We are doing a lot to promote this. For example, we have set ourselves the goal of filling 30% of senior management positions worldwide with women by 2030. We are well on our way to achieving this goal. Currently, around 26% of our senior management is female, up from around 21% three years ago. For our industry, that is a very good share. How do we foster that?
Besides special training or mentoring programs, I would like to highlight our Female Career Lounge . It is one proven concept to get women interested in STEM professions and for our company. The Female Career Lounge is a virtual event for female engineers in production areas that we conducted for the second time in 2023 with success. In 2023 alone, we hired almost 80 top female engineers with professional experience. To sum up, to remain successful as a company, the people who shape the transformation are at least as important as the right business model, products, and operational processes. With our Sustainable People Plan, we as Mercedes-Benz are shaping this transformation in a future-oriented, socially acceptable, and responsible manner.
We as HR empower our employees in becoming the best version of themselves to be successful in a digital and electric future, now and in the future. Another focus of the Just Transition at Mercedes-Benz is the strengthening of human rights in the company and along the value chain. Therefore, I'm happy to hand over the word to my colleague Renata, who will give us a deep dive into this topic.
Thank you, Sabine. I'd like to provide you with an update on a topic that is not only very important to me personally, but also to us as a company: the respect for human rights along our supply chain. Last year, I outlined our efforts in this important area, and our ambition continues. We want to provide the best products to our customers while actively tackling human rights risks. We strive to live up to the expectations placed upon us, not only from capital markets and our investors, but also from our customers, employees, and other stakeholders.
We do this not only because we have to, but above all because we want to. At last year's conference, I already mentioned that we as an automobile company need to respond to increasing regulatory requirements at both the national and the international level. As you can see, many different laws came into force in the last years. These are dynamic times where we are always challenged to stay on our toes. Only last Friday, the EU Council announced that a qualified majority has been achieved for the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive. And there are more challenging regulations to come within and beyond the EU. But we are confident that the right internal processes, as well as collaboration with different stakeholders, will help us navigate this winding road safe and sound. And we don't just want to meet legal standards and proceed according to the check-the-box principle.
We also really want to change things for the better. We strive to respect the human rights of affected people in our supply chains and make an impact on the ground. Let's dive a little bit deeper to learn about current projects and achievements. Long before facing the current legal requirements, Mercedes-Benz developed its Human Rights Respect Syste m and became a pioneer in the industry. Yet, we are constantly challenging ourselves to get better, for example, by evaluating and further developing our processes, by sharpening responsibilities, and by implementing processes and measures to educate and raise awareness inside and outside the organization. At the end of last year, we rolled out a training on human rights compliance that is obligatory for the management level group-wide. In addition, we further improved our supply chain due diligence by using digital tools.
This helps us to obtain information on possible risks in our supply chain and tackle them accordingly. Yet, the development of internal processes and measures is just a puzzle piece among many. We are well aware that negative human rights impacts in our supply chain are often structural in nature, which a single company cannot redefine alone. Less bureaucracy and more impact are really key. In order to develop solutions, we need industry-wide action, standardization, and the inclusion of affected people. That's why we strongly welcome cross-sectoral collaboration. That's why we closely work in and with various initiatives, networks, or civil society organizations. One important multi-stakeholder initiative where we are actively engaged is the sector dialogue of the German automotive industry. One of our goals, together with other OEMs, suppliers, associations, and civil society organizations, is to discuss and develop concrete projects that do make a difference.
Let me give you one example. Last year, I announced a PILOT project to establish a cross-company grievance mechanism in Mexico. A lot of work has been done since then, together with other companies, but also in close collaboration with civil society organizations. We are confident that the project will officially start in the coming months. The project complements our own whistleblower system. Coordination units will be set up in Mexico and Germany, and experts will be involved to deal with incoming complaints. This project will be a groundbreaking institution, especially for people in our deeper supply chain. In this regard, it makes perfect sense to work together with other companies. At the end of the day, for the people who are affected, it doesn't matter whether their work ends up in a Mercedes or another car brand.
They want their rights to be respected and have access to remedies if something goes wrong. In addition to collaborating with others, it is also indispensable to further increase transparency in our own supply chain. This is an ongoing challenge. What we do makes progress. And of course, the more we know, the better we can initiate changes. Our raw material assessments are at the core of our due diligence efforts in the deeper supply chain. In a robust process aligned with the UN G uiding Principles for Business and Human Rights, our procurement division identifies the human rights and environmental risks associated with a focused scope of 24 raw materials. This is a lot of work, but we are on track. In fact, we are moving more quickly than anticipated. At the end of 2023, we achieved 57% of the overall assessment process across all 24 materials.
It is important to note that a completed raw material assessment does not mark the end, but the beginning of a continuous due diligence process. Our new raw material report, which was published in November last year, is another significant step forward. Of course, the scope is now bigger. We report our progress on 15 raw materials. In addition, we took steps towards becoming more measurable. This includes a detailed explanation of our methodology, more insights in how we rate and rank our salient risk areas, and steps to quantify the performance of our suppliers. As we go through the raw material assessments, we build our expertise and identify correlations, synergies, and issues that present a similar challenge across materials. One of these is the importance of community and Indigenous people rights, which we have identified as potential high risk in most of our assessments so far.
This naturally catches our attention. We make it our focus and act on it in three ways: on the level of standards, by taking on responsibility together, and through direct engagement with affected communities. First, standards are one of the most important instruments to bridge the gap between affected communities and us as OEMs. To be able to do that, audits need to be inclusive and transparent. We therefore provided support to the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance to finance additional community outreach around audits and recap lessons learned from the process. Second, protecting human rights in complex supply chains is not only possible when we share the responsibilities. Together with our partner, Norsk Hydro, we will push measurable social progress in an area tied to Norsk Hydro's aluminum value chain in Brazil.
We are excited to announce this new project today, adding a human rights, biodiversity, and reforestation component to a partnership that is also essential to achieving our CO2 targets. Third, we make efforts to be in touch with affected rights holders directly. After three years of engaging with bauxite mining in Guinea from afar, a Mercedes-Benz team went to the mining region of Boké in an embedded mission with two international NGOs. Under guidance and with support of local civil society, the team was able to meet with six mining communities. Their input has helped us to directly engage with mining operators in Guinea, especially on issues of water and land that were identified by mining communities. Now that we have taken a joint look at our efforts and progress to protect human rights along our supply chains, I'd like to hand it back to Steffen. Thank you.
Thank you, Renata, for these insights and for outlining our achievements in and ambitions for such an important subject. I would now like to welcome Renata and Sabine for a talk on another key social topic, the Just Transit ion, which, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, OECD, recognizes that social and environmental issues are obviously interlinked and that these issues further broaden the debate around moving to a low-carbon economy. Sabine, Renata, pleasure to have you here. So, Renata, what are the priorities for Mercedes-Benz in shaping the transformation in a responsible manner?
If, I think, if you heard our presentation so far, we are doing that on a lot of levels. Let me put it in these words. The transition to a low-carbon economy naturally includes a lot of challenges. In particular, tackle climate change. We have heard about that today. It's a complex task. We can do that only if we are collaborating with others. Mercedes is part of that. We have different levels. If you look at the transition as such, then I think we must also think that it makes people probably feel uncomfortable from time to time because they are thinking about, you know, what does this mean for me personally, professionally, or directly what does it signify for my job? That's, I think, the people plan, which Sabine just presented, is really a key strategy issue for our company.
But there are other levels that are just presented, respecting human rights in the supply chain. I think we need to focus in that regard on workers in the supply chain. In particular, naturally, with the transition to electromobility, it's about the right of workers in the battery supply chain, for example, or in general, in critical raw materials as such. Then what I've said at the beginning, we are not speaking about the transition of one single company. We are speaking about the transformation of a complex industrial system.
There we need a close collaboration between politics, legislators, civil society, and our business. Probably a last point. It's not only our own operations. We have also to think outside of our factory gates. I think about the communities surrounded by the extractions of raw materials in particular, with batteries, with lithium, with cobalt. That's all we know, that. And we need to take care and to look also at their rights in order to have a responsible and Just Transition in all the areas.
Thanks, Renata, for opening up the umbrella of the pieces of the Just Transition. So, Sabine, Renata has talked about the importance of the People Plan you have laid out in your introductory statement, the three R's and kind of the Sustainable People Plan. Can you elaborate a little bit about one of the focus areas, obviously, of the transformation, which is for sure the powertrain? So how are we going on here? What does it mean for the people?
Thanks, Steffen for the question. I think powertrain plants are most associated with the transformation, even though we have also other fields. Let's dig a little bit deeper into the plan for the powertrain plants. I think, first of all, what we do is we have target plans, target pictures for all our powertrain plants. In those target pictures, we sketch a picture of the future. Future electric components are allocated to these powertrain plants. We have heard about the eCampus in Untertürkheim. Also in Untertürkheim, in Sebeș, and in Beijing, we will have electric drive units being assembled and being produced. In Berlin, we will have the high-performance electric engine for the AMG platform. In Hamburg and in Untertürkheim, there will be axles on an electric basis and electric components. Those are future components.
But be very fair, we will need fewer people for those electric components. And that is then our job to manage the transition from today to tomorrow very responsibly with the instruments of HR. What are these instruments? First of all, we use demographic issues like fluctuation, like retirement, because as we have seen, we lose 10% of our workforce over the next 10 years. That gives us a little bit of time. Secondly, what we do is we really put the focus on the reskilling initiatives. And you might remember the Digital Pioneer s that we had in Berlin, where we qualified people, blue-collar, into software engineers. And we had a first cohort in Berlin, a second cohort in Untertürkheim. And now we are working in the third cohort. We are also offering other job possibilities in the location.
Therefore, we have flexible assignments in the respective plans to show where there are other places. And last but not least, we also offer mutual agreements to leave the company with severance packages. And we're currently doing that in Berlin and in Untertürkheim. It's a mutual severance agreement, which is on a voluntary basis, because on the other hand, we still offer job security until 2029 to provide a framework in which people can move. The fourth component is we also offer other jobs at other locations, in other assembly plants, or, for instance, shifts from Untertürkheim to Sindelfingen in our assembly plant by also incentivizing those moves. And the last but not least, we offer that you can leave the company and have a safe get-back clause between one or two years to orientate yourself in other jobs and then find a new future.
All those instruments are very good. But we have to work also on the mindset, on the mindset of embracing the change and embracing this transformation. This is why we started Transformation On last year. What is Transformation On? It's an initiative targeted at employees, but also at executives, to engage dialogue, to communicate about the transformation, to provide adequate information on all issues involved. So we rolled out an app. We have market stalls, workshops. We selected transformation ambassadors to really spread the news of what the possibilities are. And we will open also physical opportunities called stations where people can meet and discuss all these challenges around transformation. Because we have to really be very honest, we will get slimmer over time. And we will do everything to do that in a very socially acceptable manner and provide opportunities to people who might be leaving us.
Thanks, Sabine, for sharing on the people side of our Just Transition. So, Renata, you said besides the people part, which is a very important one, there are important stakeholders on the supply chain. There are the so-called rights holders and the communities. Can you share a bit with the audience how we are interacting and engaging with those types of stakeholders?
Yeah. In fact, with the transition to electromobility, we have a lot of complex supply chains, which we have to manage. And I think the presentations have shown managing these complex supply chains are really big tasks. And the supply chains concerning the raw materials in connection with electromobility are certainly one of the most complex. Now we are assessing this supply chain. We have these 24 raw materials, which we classified as materials. And we are working on that.
And we are quite successful in that. And we will hope in 2028, we will have 100% of this supply chain transparent. But that's not all what we are doing. We are engaging in several initiatives. And one example is, for example, the Responsible Lithium Partnership , which was founded in 2021 by different companies, by BASF, Fairphone, Daimler Trucks, Volkswagen, BMW, and also Mercedes-Benz. And what is this partnership doing?
We want to really create and establish a common, and that's important, must be a common vision of the future of the Salar de Atacama Basin in Chile, where we want to improve the management of natural resources. In particular, in terms of the water resources, we want to reduce, with that partnership, conflicts which are related to water consumption. That's a huge issue there. I think with the partnership, where everybody can get into contact, that's important. Because this partnership consists of 22 representatives of local Indigenous communities, of local civil society, of local private sector and governance, and also, very important, of local mining companies. With that, this multi-platform also provides accessible and understandable information. It also gives the possibility that the organizations and the companies are exchanging information on a high level. That's very important.
We got very good feedback from the local communities because that allows them really to get the necessary information. And that's why also in this January, it was decided to extend this partnership until 2025 in order to really create a sustainable long-term impact. And that's only one initiative we are engaging in. And with that, we hope that we can manage the social and environmental impact of these complex supply chains.
Thanks, Renata. Sabine, from the supply side, once again back into the company, towards the people side. You mentioned in your presentation that, obviously, AI, digitization, can change companies and can change the way we work and interact in a company. Under the heading of Just Transition, what to bear in mind, where to pay attention, how do you look at it?
Well, that's a complex topic, AI, because the promises with AI are that you have more time for transformational tasks and that you can eliminate the transactional tasks, that you gain more efficiency, that burdened administration processes can be streamlined, and that overall, the work is going to be more effective. So what did we do or what do we do to really take our people from today into tomorrow? First of all, we use artificial intelligence in a lot of issues all over the company, from the MBUX in our car to production to R&D to digital twins or in procurement. With ChatGPT or the large language model, additional opportunities are now offered. We created accelerator teams where use cases from different parts of the companies are now elaborated to really underline and support the strategic purpose of the respective function and make things easier.
So for our people, we rolled out the Mercedes-Benz Direct Chat application, where everybody can really test and try and work with AI and large language models. We also started to offer a curated learning path for people being at the very beginning and just trying to, how do I prompt? How do I use the system? But up to data and AI specialists. And as I mentioned in my presentation last year alone, we qualified 600 experts in data and AI applications. So we want to tackle this challenge on various levels, so with use cases specifically for all departments, functions, and plans, for everybody to really support the pioneering spirit of our employees to really work in their processes, apply new methods of working, but also in very specific and dedicated cases, like we do with our data specialists and AI engineers.
If we talk about what are the consequences of the applications, I think we are just at the beginning of this era. There are going to be new jobs, new profiles emerging. Other profiles will be disappearing. It's our job to really manage that transition and to bridge the gap between today and tomorrow.
Thank you. Renata, perhaps a last one for you. You made the point about the necessity of the right political framework for the Just Transition. I remember on one of your charts, there was kind of the winding road of EU regulations. So how do we engage with governments? And what's our role at that end?
Yeah. I think transformation is not an easy task. I think probably for everyone. We need all the forces together. That goes back to my response to my first question here. We need close collaboration between legislators, politics, social society, NGOs, and business. I think it's also important that companies take a clear stance with regard to relevant questions. I think engagement, political engagement, is part of our democracy. That's important. With that, to bring our interest also into a political level shows also that we want to share our experiences. I think that's an important point. What is also important in the future is, I think, in the dynamic environment we have, the technical developments. Sabine just mentioned also artificial intelligence. We see what happens is that often the legislators go behind all these developments.
What we learned is that the most efficient decisions and also legislations we get if we are involved in an early process in the legislation process. I think that's important because we need to find a balance between effective regulations, because naturally, we want to have effective regulations, responsible legislation, but also the legislation should not hinder innovation. This balance is very complex. I think for that, we are very engaged.
We have our stakeholder dialogues, where we are in really regular contact with NGOs, where we share our opinions also under the chat and rules. But it is also important to say that, naturally, if we are getting engaged in these processes, that the public has the right to be informed about this advocacy. We are reporting, for example, our activities in that regard on a regular basis in our Climate Policy Report. But I think a stable engagement and an active engagement from business in all these questions is very important.
Thanks, Renata, Sabine, for sharing with us on our approach to shaping a Just Transition while focusing on the two strategic fields of action, people and human rights, but also on its responsible policy and community engagement. We've already heard about digitalization in several previous agenda items. The following presentation will now focus on how we bring this together with the elementary characteristic of trust. We call it digital trust. We'll learn more about this from Renata again. The stage is yours.
The automotive industry is undergoing tremendous change and transformation. A key driver of this transformation is the dynamic and disruptive development of digital technologies, products, and services. At Mercedes-Benz, we are transforming from a car manufacturer to a software-driven company, or in other words, from steel to software. The rapid digital transformation and the resulting complex challenges lead to two developments. First, they are causing uncertainty in our industry, among our external stakeholders, and in society. Second, in an effort to keep up with the pace of the ongoing transformation, governments worldwide are responding to these new technologies and digital risks with new regulatory requirements. How do we deal with this as a company? Of course, we take all necessary steps to comply with such requirements. But that's not enough. We need our stakeholders' trust in our approach to dealing with digital innovation.
We are convinced this is a necessary condition for sustainable and competitive business success in this new area. That is why our target is building digital trust. We are driven by the ambition to actively build and maintain trust among stakeholders. At the same time, we aim to foster innovation and leverage the potential of new technologies. Therefore, we drive the digital transformation with trust formation. Let me show you where we have already made some progress. The responsible and secure handling of data is essential to foster trust among our customers. We do this with our Data Principles and our Data Vision . Our seven Data Principles provide a strong basis for the responsible handling of data at Mercedes-Benz. They cover aspects like transparency, choice, and data security. They support our employees in working with data by setting the direction and determining which aspects need to be considered.
These principles serve as an inner compass, so to say. In addition, our Data Vision emphasizes customers' trust as our foundation for sustainable digital products and services to realize their full business potential. In order to enhance our customers' trust, we approach them in a convenient manner and provide them with intuitive and honest information about data usage and their choices in this context. This is why we included our Privacy Cente r in the Mercedes me app. It allows customers transparency and control over the use of their data. Let's turn to another major topic, artificial intelligence. We at Mercedes-Benz believe in the great opportunities of AI. We are convinced that AI can help us shape the future in a positive way. Therefore, we want to leverage its potential and foster AI innovation, both for our customers and for our employees.
At the same time, we are aware of the risks and uncertainties related to AI. As with other technologies, AI is not inherently good or bad. It is all about how you work with it and how you manage the risks. Already in 2019, we developed the Mercedes-Benz AI Principles for the responsible handling of AI and anchored them in our Integrity Code. They complement the Data Vision and are the basis for our responsible AI approach. Our AI principles stand for responsible use, explainability, protection of privacy, and safety and reliability. We apply these AI principles both in our cars and as a part of enterprise processes. At the CES in Las Vegas this January, we introduced the MBUX Virtual Assistant, a voice assistant in the car's entertainment system, which takes advantage of GenAI for a more natural dialogue in response to queries and commands.
With our in-house GenAI chatbot, MB Direct Chat, we empower our employees to use ChatGPT in a business context, thanks to several technical safeguards. Sabine referred to these opportunities for our employees in her presentation already. Our clear commitment to these principles and their application is an important element of promoting digital trust among our customers, employees, and other stakeholders. But how can we drive innovation, meet the requirements of regulatory dynamics, and foster digital trust at the same time? It is clear that governance plays a crucial role, but it has to be well-balanced. We believe that the answer to this complex question is adaptive governance. In order to succeed here, we have to anticipate new risks and regulatory developments, adapt to these changes, and define suitable guardrails to deal with the risks responsibly. In addition, digital innovation can lead to new ethical questions that need to be addressed.
We pursue a holistic perspective by collaborating cross-functionally between experts from legal, ethics, compliance, and business partners with a clear end-to-end thinking. This approach helps our company to develop digital innovations rapidly but also responsibly. However, cross-functional collaboration includes having sometimes emotional discussions about what is right and what the balance between risk management and business innovation should be. Dilemma situations exist and need to be handled responsibly. These are not easy discussions, but they are the right discussions to have. They demonstrate our sincere commitment to our principles. I am convinced that the consequent application of adaptive governance enables digital trust as a key driver of sustainable and competitive digital business.
Hello, and welcome for me, too. My name is Harald Wilhelm, and I'm responsible for finance as well as for Mercedes-Benz Mobility. Sustainability is about securing our long-term future. This includes our ability to invest into new and greener technologies at a time when geopolitical and macroeconomic factors are extremely volatile. Only those companies which can fund the development and scale sustainable technologies in production will make the difference on the path to a low-carbon era. Mercedes-Benz invented the motor car 138 years ago and invested around EUR 14 billion in 2023, more per vehicle than any other large manufacturer. Our financial results in 2023 show that we have made significant progress in making Mercedes-Benz more resilient despite a challenging environment. We continue to implement our Sustainable Business Strateg y towards Ambition 2039, which is reflected in the 73% increase in BEV sales of the Mercedes-Benz brand last year.
However, we have heard today that we can't decouple ourselves from market conditions and ultimately from what customers want. The transformation into an all-electric future is still the destination we are aiming for, but the path to get there is not a straight line. As Ola said in his introduction, we now expect xEV sales of our passenger cars to reach as high as 50% in the new vehicle fleet in the second half of the decade. At the same time, we continue to follow our value-over-volume strategy. Therefore, we see no reason to artificially push products into the market. Does this mean that we are reducing our investments in electric vehicles? No. We are investing significant amounts in our all-electric vehicle architectures, drivetrains, and batteries, as shown by the EV share of 47% of our total investments in 2023.
The good news is that healthy profits from our cutting-edge hybrid and combustion engine lineup will continue to fund this investment. With almost EUR 36 billion of free cash flow generated since 2020, I think it's fair to say our products are cash-generating machines. Despite all this, we confirm our medium-term goal of reducing investments in the second half of the decade by minus 20% compared to 2019 levels, based on fewer vehicle platforms than today and therefore less complexity and investment needs. This also gives us the flexibility to keep our combustion engine cutting-edge and compliant with upcoming emission standards well into the second half of the decade. In addition, we are investing in the decarbonization of our value chain.
France and Europe have shown us good examples of this, such as the expansion of the renewable energies for our own production plants or the investment in our own high-performance charging network in the planned amount of EUR 1.4 billion by 2028. With this approach, we are moving forward with our Ambition 2039 and have the flexibility to meet all of our customer needs well into the 2030s, whether it's an all-electric powertrain or an internal combustion engine. How are we preparing our company for this transformation? We started early on to prepare the company for the structural changes driven by climate change and the transition to renewable energy sources. To put it simply, we have optimized our footprint and lowered the cost base. What did we do on capacity?
We significantly reduced our break-even point in production to 1-1.5 million units, among other things, by optimizing the global production network, including the sale of production sites as in France, Brazil, and in the Russian plant. Another good example of our transformation is the conversion of the powertrain plant in Jawor, in Poland, into a VAN.EA production site. Thanks to our highly flexible production network, we can produce xEVs and combustion engine vehicles on a single production line, maximizing the utilization of our assets, which includes experienced assembly staff. In this way, we mitigate risks faced by other competitors who sought to split their companies into a BEV entity and a combustion engine entity. What are we doing on the cost side? We see that the variable cost of BEVs will exceed the cost of combustion engine vehicles for the foreseeable future.
What are our efforts to reduce these costs? We use all levers to aim for a double-digit margin also in the future. Let me give you a few examples. On scale, we design our future all-electric architectures in a way that we can use common components and synergy parts. On batteries, we believe that we can reduce today's battery average cost per kilowatt-hour by more than 30% over the next few years, among others through an optimized cell and module design, as well as further development of NMC and next-generation LFP batteries. On the procurement side, we target to reduce material cost in the next years. Our goal is a structurally lower cost base in cooperation with suppliers. Summing it up, we calibrate our business systems so that Mercedes-Benz can be a double-digit margin company throughout the transformation towards net carbon neutrality.
This leads me to my next point, our EU Taxonomy reporting for 2023. The Taxonomy-aligned revenue share for cars and vans increased to 14% in line with our xEV sales. Our Taxonomy-aligned capital expenditure increased 29% year-over-year. This was mainly due to an increase of 47% in Taxonomy-aligned investments in intangible assets. Above all, this includes capitalized development cost for the transformation to all-electric vehicles. The Taxonomy-aligned operating expenses, which are mainly non-capitalized development costs, were impacted by a higher capitalization share of our electric vehicles investment, as previously mentioned. But at the end of the day, it's all about how we are externally evaluated on our overall ESG performance. ESG ratings are important on the capital market and in the sustainability-oriented investment process as they serve as a further decision-making aid for many investors.
Since 2019, with the announcement of our Sustainable Business Strategy and Ambition 2039, we have significantly improved our ESG rating scores at MSCI and Sustainalytics and successfully maintained our already high level at the ISS ESG and CDP Climate Change. What stands out is our latest upgrade at Sustainalytics from medium to low risk. This is thanks to the effort of the whole Mercedes-Benz team. In direct comparison with our competitors in the automotive sector, we are among the best-rated companies. This makes us both proud and mindful in the knowledge that these results are only possible through continuous execution of our Sustainable Business Strategy and Ambition 2039. We also live up to our sustainability commitment when we act as an investor ourselves. With our pension assets, we strive to foster sustainable business models.
Our focus is on integrating sustainability aspects into our investment decisions to ensure that the associated risk and return aspects are properly considered. The group utilizes opportunities arising from sustainability developments by committing to ESG-themed investments. We have defined carbon reduction targets and have already successfully lowered the carbon footprint of our German pension assets compared to the aggregated benchmark. This means that EUR 8.1 billion of our assets are invested in such a way that a carbon reduction target has to be reached. This volume equals 37% of our group pension assets by the end of last year. To sum it up, we continue to demonstrate resilience and are executing our strategy of profitable and sustainable growth even in a challenging market environment. Our financing needs for the transformation are covered by our current portfolio of desirable cars and premium vans. Our strategic direction is clear.
We stay focused on our investments in all-electric vehicles. At the same time, we use our flexibility to tactically respond to market conditions and customer demand. We are taking every effort to set up our business to deliver a strong financial performance during the transformation towards Ambition 2039. Well, that's it for me. Thanks very much. Now I think it's time for our second Q&A.
As Harald has said, it's time for the second Q&A. We are happy to have with us Renata Jungo Brüngger, Board Member responsible for Integrity, Governance, and Sustainability, Sabine Kohleisen, Board Member responsible for Human Relations, as well as Labor Director, and Harald Wilhelm, our CFO. We'd like to politely ask you to again focus your questions on the topics we just presented: Sustainable People Plan, Human Rights along the Supply Chain, the Just Transition, Digital Trust, and Sustainable Finance. Once again, the operator will explain the procedure. Operator, please.
Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, at our customers' request, this conference call will be recorded. If you want to ask a question, please press nine and the star key on your telephone keypad. To withdraw the question, please press nine and the star key again. As a reminder, please ask your question in English. As a matter of fairness, please limit the number of questions to a maximum of two to give everybody on this call the opportunity to ask questions.
Moreover, I would like to remind you that this telephone conference is governed by the Safe Harbor wording that you will find in our published results documents. Please note that our presentations contain forward-looking statements that reflect management's current views with respect to future events. Such statements are subject to many risks and uncertainties. If the assumptions underlying any of these statements prove incorrect, then actual results may be materially different from those expressed or implied by such statements. Forward-looking statements speak only through the date on which they are made. May I now hand it over to Steffen?
Yeah. Thank you very much. We had a first question or we had a question in the first round, which was by Justin, Justin Kew from Balyasny. And we just said, content-wise, it fits super well to this round. Renata, I just want to read it out to the audience. With regard to the Critical Raw Materials Act in Europe, can you comment, please, on what do you believe are the challenges on this regulation? Can you share with us your efforts to mitigate adverse impacts with respect to labor rights, human rights, and environmental protection in the supply chain?
Yeah. Thank you, Steffen. Let me first a little bit make the frame. I think I have very well presented in detail that Mercedes-Benz is working hard on systematically putting and managing their supply chain, in particular in view of protecting human rights in the supply chain. That means we are improving, adapting in a systematic way on a regular basis our due diligence processes. And into that, we apply a multiple variety of measures and also concepts. That means we are looking into a materiality analysis on a regular basis. We do review our due diligence processes. We look into digital tools. We do really improve the management on a regular basis. And through these measures, naturally, and that's very important, we also enhance the compliance system in general. We are adding social standards, and we are looking into the environmental requirements.
Now, with regard to the Raw Materials Act, let me say it that way. We welcome the Raw Materials Act. What we see with all the different legislations we have in the meantime in Europe and also in the world, we are getting overlapping requirements, which is from time to time for companies difficult to manage. We also see that we have more and more reporting requirements, which leads to our overburden in this regard. That said, we welcome the act. What is important now, we will look at how the implementation will work. What I just said, we hope it will go without too big bureaucracy.
Thank you, Renata, for clarifying this one. We would continue with Marc Lavaud from ODDO BHF.
Yes. Thank you very much. Marc Lavaud again from ODDO BHF. Thank you for the presentation, and thank you for taking my questions. Two questions, both regarding the EU regulation CS3D. So I wanted to know what, according to you, are the similarities between the CS3D from the EU and the German LKSG. And second question, I wanted to know what your understanding was regarding how deep into your supply chain you have to do your due diligence. Is it only about direct suppliers or also about Tier 2 and Tier 3 suppliers? Thank you.
Yes. With regard to the CS3D or the Corporate Sustainability Directive and the so-called Supply Due Diligence Act in Germany, I think we can deal with that very well. We have implemented within Mercedes our Human Rights Respect System already years ago. We have worked on a regular basis with the German authorities in view of the implementation of the Due Diligence Supply Chain Act. And we have welcomed, in fact, the act in order to create a fair level playing field within all the societies and companies. Now, I think with the solution we have now in Europe, we will find, I think, a good balance. And it supports, in fact, the German legislation. We have to analyze the details in this regard during the next weeks. But we are very confident that we can deal also with the EU legislation very well.
Now, with regard to your question, it would naturally be easy if we only would have to take care of the first tier in the supply chain. In fact, contractually and legally, we have only a contract with our first tier supplier. It's always difficult to go into deeper supply chain. But naturally, we do have a due diligence task to look into that. We are working very closely with all our suppliers. And we see there are queries in the deeper supply chain. We naturally go into that. We are doing also audits. So we are checking it.
We cannot control everything. That's a complex task. Supply chains are not changed. They are a complex network. But naturally, we have a due diligence task to look into it. We do that also on a regular basis, also by working together with different partnerships and initiatives, by doing third-party audits in order really to get a feeling how the, in particular with the risk raw material, how the supply chains are working.
Thanks, Renata. Thank you, Marc, for your question. We go to Scandinavia with a question from Alecta Investment Management, Michele Prisco, please.
Good afternoon and thanks for taking my questions. Michele Prisco from Alecta here. Alecta is focused on diversity and inclusion. I'd like to ask, within the Reshape, Reskill, and Recharge framework, what are the initiatives Mercedes is taking to ensure a diverse career pipeline and a diverse talent attraction? Also, what are the considerations made in terms of gender pay gap? What are the measures Mercedes intends to take to increase transparency on that and also the related strategy? Thanks.
Diversity is one of our core values. We have a lot of activities to ensure that we have a diverse talent pipeline and diverse management all over the world. We have various measures and various issues here in place, starting with training, awareness, also continued by special mentorships for special groups of people. Because if you look into our global organization, you have the topic of gender diversity, primarily in Germany. You have all kinds of other diversity issues if you look into South Africa or into the U.S. What we do is we target here plans and quotas, so to speak, to really incorporate all these different measures. We bring in internationals also into our German operations to also foster here some diversity and inclusion aspects. We measure diversity and inclusion in our corporate employee survey through a question.
And we have also incorporated target values in our compensation system, so to make very clear that diversity and inclusion is for us a core value of the company. We have 142 nations working together. So you see that that is something which we really put our focus on. To sum it up, we have training, awareness. We really look also into the talent pipelines when we do succession planning, that we have a diverse community also here. And when we select candidates for leadership positions, we take into account that we have a diverse panel. And of this panel, candidates then are selected. So maybe just a short intro into that diversity and inclusion topic. Talking about gender pay gap, Mercedes-Benz doesn't make any difference in the pay. There is no gender pay gap.
If you look into, let's say, around about 150,000 employees, which are in Germany, we are nearly organized in all those for the whole group in the German metal and electro industry, which is a tariff-based system. There is, irrespective of nationality, religion, sexual orientation, or gender, there is no differentiation. It's the task, the responsibility, and the qualification that you need to determine what is your pay. In Germany, we have a so-called Entgelttransparenzgesetz, which means that you have to provide maximum transparency on the pay.
We do so by implementing a dashboard in our social intranet where everybody can see what is the average pay in my respective function at my respective level versus between genders to make very transparent what is happening here. I have to admit that also other factors play into your compensation. It's how long are you in your position, how experienced you are, what is your, how do you say it, how long do you adhere to the company, how long are you taking over this kind of responsibility. So if there are any differences, they result from your experience and your competencies, but never from your gender. That is, for us, a very, very important topic as well.
Thanks, Sabine, for that transparency. Thanks, Michele, for your question. We stay geographically in Sweden with Fredric Nyström from AP3, Swedish National Pension Fund.
Yes. Good afternoon. Thank you for a good presentation. I have a question related to the target of 100% of supply chain transparent. What can we expect in the case of reporting from that due diligence or the supply chain? We know that there are challenges on reporting on all potential findings of forced labor, for example. So just if you can elaborate on that, what we can expect in the sake of transparency. And also another question related to the last panel. And correct me if I'm wrong here. But to me, it sounded that they were talking about regionalizing supply chains, one for U.S., one E.U. Was that correct? And how would you apply different standards on different supply chains?
Yes. OK. Target to make 100% all the supply chain transparent, that's naturally an impossible task. We have over 10,000 direct suppliers. That will not be possible. We are speaking here about the raw material, the risk raw material we defined to be so-called risk raw materials, in particular with regard to the transition to the electromobility. We speak here about typical supply chains concerning lithium, cobalt, nickel, and so on. The idea there is, or the ambition we have, is to have them make transparent until 2028. What I have said in my presentation, to make them transparent doesn't mean that we are at the end of the due diligence process. It starts there because then we have the necessary information to really go deeper into the supply chain. As you know, supply chains are changing. That's a marathon. It's not a sprint.
It will be a task which we will have all the time as long as we have suppliers in that regard. With regard to the reporting, we have official reporting. What we have to do in accordance with the regulations. Naturally, we will do that. In Germany, we have to report to the BAFA, where we also have to show what we are doing on a regular basis. With regard to particular reporting to individual supplier relationship, we have there a clear policy that we will not comment on that in detail or on individual supplier relationships. We will naturally fulfill our legislative reporting we have to do. We are working hard on that to really make them transparent. Now, with regard to the regionalization, yes, naturally, we want to be more regional. So that we want to regionalize the supply chain.
That means, naturally, that we will apply all the standards we have here worldwide also in the regions then. Because our concept is working in the way that the standards we are setting, for example, our Responsible Sourcing Standards apply to all organizations on a worldwide basis and to all supplier relationships. So that doesn't change anything with regard to our due diligence process and with regard to our compliance systems in this regard.
Thank you very much. We go to Société Générale, Stephen Reitman.
Yes. Thank you very much. My question is about employment at Mercedes. You pointed out that you are using flexibility and looking at the age curve and other aspects to manage the requirements of the business as it transitions towards BEV. Could you maybe a bit more granularity on that, how effective the age curve and natural wastage will be in terms of meeting the demands of the business, and how much would need to be special to extra measures in terms of buying people out? Thank you.
This is a very difficult question, Mr. Reitman. You are not the only one asking that. Even my workers' council here in Germany, they want to have exact numbers, exact procedures, and what is happening, how, and when. Frankly spoken, we have to really adjust those curves on a nearly daily basis. But the employment-related changes and the flexibility we have are dependent also on the markets and on the kind of vehicles that are currently demanded. So sometimes we have to adjust. Over time, we are going down. But I wouldn't be and it's not only that we are decreasing, but we are adding new technologies as well. So I'm just not able to point that down very exactly. We have to, excuse the expression, go with the flow and adapt all these measures according to what is currently required.
In some years, the perspective of the current year is more relevant in other years when we see a shift again to some other models. It's less demanding. What we also see, if we introduce new technologies with new qualification, then we have to put the focus more on qualifying the existing workforce than trying to reduce our workforce. That is one bucket. The second bucket is that we also use flexible instruments. To really level that out, we also have the opportunity to react here on a short-term basis.
Knowing Stephen a bit, hi, Stephen. I'm sure you want to test that with the financials, how we can meet our financial objectives with the employment policies and tools. I mean, you elaborated. I mean, I don't want to repeat anything here. But clearly, I think, I mean, on our fixed cost reduction, we're very much talking about the white-collar here. The age pyramid, I mean, helps a lot over the years to come. Basically, you can see it as a matter of fact that we're not doing any big restructuring program announcement, I mean, on white-collar in this respect. On assembly plants, well, you know the assembly plants are completely flexible between EV world and ICE world. So we don't face any issue here.
When it comes to the powertrain plans, obviously, as we heard, I mean, earlier today, transition takes long and probably longer than we expected. Hence, all of the tools, I mean, you elaborated before, I mean, really help us, I mean, to accommodate the structural change of a lower value add on the EV compared to the ICE. Rest assured, I think the HR tools and the financial targets are completely in sync.
Thank you. Could you also maybe comment on how you're finding the war for talent, basically, in terms of getting the people with the correct technical skills you need now in terms of software development and advanced electronics and electrical engineering for your future products?
Well, we are still a very attractive employer. And we are, up to now, very able to acquire new talent. And in a presentation, I pointed out the MB.OS, where we hired 900 software engineers for our MB.OS hub in Sindelfingen and 2,000 all over the world. And we tap into different talent pools, be it in India, be it in the U.S., be it in China, or here in Sindelfingen and Stuttgart. And through our really strong products and the name that we have in terms of compensation packages, additional benefit, flexible and modern working conditions, up to now, we don't have any issues in getting the right people at the right places. And I'm completely aware that that's not the case in other industries. But up to now, we have really in a lucky position that there is no problem here.
Thank you very much. Time for a short one, for a last one. Church of England Pensions Board, Laura Hillis, please.
Hi. Thank you so much. We're part of the Climate Action 100 Plus investor engagement with Mercedes. Firstly, I just wanted to acknowledge that we have a really positive relationship with management. We really appreciate the transparency and dialogue with the company very much. One of the topics that we've been talking about with the company is around climate lobbying and advocacy, both directly and via your industry associations. Firstly, I'd just note that you've increased your transparency significantly on this topic over the last few years. We really appreciate this. However, we'd be really keen to understand more about, I guess, the company's specific policy positions on topics such as when legislation is being tabled, say, in the United States or in other jurisdictions in the EU, for example.
And secondly, where you have industry associations that might be taking a different position to that the company holds. So for example, we know that some of your industry associations have taken quite negative positions on climate lobbying, so being quite against sort of EV phase-out dates, vehicle emission standards, and those sorts of topics, which seems, on the face of it, to be not great for your own goals and your own climate transition plan.
So we'd be interested to understand if there's any plans to boost transparency from Mercedes on your specific policy positions on those topics, but also if we're due to see more transparency around how you're thinking about your industry associations. I believe the last time you published a report was specifically looking at your industry associations and their approach to climate policy was in 2022. So it's been a couple of years. So yeah, keen to understand both of those topics. Thank you.
It's a good question. You know, I think what we do on a regular basis is really reporting with regard to our advocacy in climate-related legislation. I just mentioned our climate report, which we just published in November last year, where we have really detailed reporting. Furthermore, you know, we have our official report, the sustainability report, where we're reporting what we're doing. With regard to advocacy, I think one important tool we have is our stakeholder dialogues. We are really going in the open exchange with NGOs and civil society in order also to understand, you know, what is their requirement and how can we get engaged into these processes. Probably, you know, if you haven't seen the Climate Policy Report from November, it's available on our website, where we really presented in very detail how we are lobbying with regard to this legislation.
Now, with regard to associations, yes, it could be that we have different opinions with regard to certain legislation. But I think it's important that we are part of these associations. We need to be part of these associations here in Europe, in the U.S. We also try to influence the associations with regard to our opinions and to work there on a cooperative and very collaborative way. I think that's important because I think everything is transforming and developing into that direction. But we need also to be part of this exchange and to get also the necessary information. But please be assured, you know, we are speaking on a regular basis how we are reporting our advocacy in the different legislations and different legislation processes.
Thanks, Renata. And on that note, I just want to say or inform everybody that we've published today the new Climate Policy Report. We've also sent out an ESG release referring to that one. So fresh from the press, there is the info on the net. And with that, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for your questions and for being with us today. In addition, obviously, many thanks to our board members for your answers, for your presentations. After the event, as always, the teams from IR and communications are available at your disposal to answer any further questions you might have. And with that, I will hand over, Renata, to you to close out this year's ESG Conference.
Thank you, Steffen. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, our third ESG Conference draws to a close. Early today, Johan Rockström described the importance of maintaining focus at least on certain terrains. He said the challenge is to keep the eye on the goal while driving on shaky ground. I hope that today's event convinced you of our steadfast commitment to sustainability and ESG in its entire range, demonstrating determination, flexibility, and long-term perseverance. Our commitment encompasses four major goals. First, the reduction of CO2 emissions, decarbonization, and the advancement of electromobility in both product development and charging infrastructure. Second, ambitious goals for circularity and more sustainable production. Third, an explicit pledge to a Just Transition, placing people at the center of our transformation within our organization and throughout our value chain. And finally, an implementation of strategic and operational measures to embed this objective within our company culture.
Our presentations today underscore our proactive stance. Despite significant challenges, we remain firmly committed to our Sustainable Business Strategy. This commitment isn't solely out of necessity, but stems from a genuine conviction. Johan reiterated, "Those who stay on the sustainability track emerge as winners in the realms of technology, market competitiveness, and profitability." Speaking on behalf of the entire Board of Management at Mercedes-Benz, I affirm our wholehearted agreement with this statement. Thank you for participating in today's ESG Conference. Take care, and goodbye.