Volkswagen AG was in a downward spiral that threatened the venerable automaker's very survival. It was September 2015, and the " clean diesel " fairytale VW had peddled to consumers for years was revealed for the lie that it was. The German giant had outfitted millions of cars with software to cheat on tailpipe emissions tests, triggering a rebuke from the US government and a corporate reckoning that cost Volkswagen €32 billion ($37.2 billion) in fines, legal fees and recall costs, along with unmeasurable damage to its reputation. Berthold Huber, interim chairman at the time, called the affair a "political and moral catastrophe," and Wolfgang Porsche, a patriarch of the billionaire Porsche-Piëch clan that controls the company, deemed it a " crisis of trust ."