Volkswagen’s number one ambition to become the worlds largest and therefore number 1 manufacture hasn’t been fully realised just yet as it remained “bolted” in 2nd position. There isn’t an official leaderboard for this type of corporate warfare, becoming number 1 is a good motivational and marketing tool. VW has managed to narrow the sales gap too Toyota in the first nine months of the year but the final quarter seems to be tight. The VW Group, which includes all product portfolio’s, managed to shift 72,000 units less than Toyota compared with the 227k units VW shifted for September of last year. VW’s push into China has helped push up demand and Toyota continues to retain a firm grip on demand in the US market. Toyota and Volkswagen are looking shift 10 million cars for 2014 while previous number 1, General Motors, has slipped back too 3rd with around 7 million sales predicted. Volkswagen has recently been hit with a number of recalls, just over 1 million cars, the Beetle, Jetta and Sagitar have suspension defects and Audi is recalling at least 850,000 A4’s because of faulty airbag software. Demand for Toyota in the US rose by 5.7 percent in the period of September, the Rav4 saw the biggest rise in demand with a 26% increase in sales. The US continues to be Toyota’s key sales battleground but not so for VW as sales fell by 13 percent in the same period though Audi seemed to fare better with a 15 percent surge. VW’s US puzzle is much less confusing in China where  demand rose by 15 percent, the territory is expected to play an influential role in boosting VW’s determination to become the world largest manufacture by volume and sales. You see its good for share prices and for the executives who will probably get bonuses as a result. Toyota has said that it will seek to concentrate on improving the quality of its product’s and may well be happy to see VW jump ahead.