VW US CEO: 'This company has to bloody learn'

Volkswagen (VOW3-DE) America CEO Michael Horn apologized Thursday at a hearing on Capitol Hill and said the automaker is "determined to make things right" after years of deception on an air pollution device.

Horn made his comments at the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, where Rep. Tim Murphy, R-Pa., called Volkswagen's emissions cheating a "fundamental violation of public trust."

"We have to streamline our processes, and this company has to bloody learn and use this opportunity in order to get their act together," Horn said.

He said that he had no knowledge of the faulty software prior to his meeting with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the California Air Resources Board on Sept. 3, 2015.

"To the best of my knowledge today, this was not a corporate decision," he said. "This was a couple of software engineers who put this in for whatever reasons and I would also like to find out."

Horn, a German who has worked at VW for 25 years, said he did not think something like that would be possible at his company. "These events are deeply troubling," he said.

Representatives were most concerned about the nearly half a million affected cars sold in the U.S. Horn explained that for about 430,000 of those vehicles, a software-only fix would be technically unworkable; a hardware fix would also be needed.

Horn apologized for not having specific dates on when technical remedies could be expected as investigations are still ongoing, but he said new software could be available early next year. He added that the full remedy could take years.