Successful Porsche CEO Oliver Blume given top VW role after the departure of the polarising Herbert Diess
The top job at one of the world’s biggest carmakers has changed again, with the departure of Herbert Diess after a four-year stint at the helm of the Volkswagen Group.
Diess – a former BMW executive who joined VW in 2015 – inherited a bloated company reeling from the fallout of Dieselgate and set it on a rapid-fire path towards electrification.
Diess (above right) oversaw the launch of the VW ID electric range and he worked tirelessly to rein in costs, which ultimately brought him into conflict with VW’s powerful trade unions.
His legacy will include a 50 percent increase in expenditure on EVs in 2022, with almost A$100 billion earmarked for electric vehicle development this year alone.
Diess has also publicly lauded Tesla and Elon Musk’s work in the EV space, even inviting Musk to address a meeting of 200 VW executives on a Zoom call in 2021.
A lack of progress on key internal pieces of work, including a software business and a plan to float Porsche on the stock market, seems to have been the catalyst for Diess’s departure – though his flamboyant and outspoken demeanor would not have made him many allies in the typically buttoned-down VW corporate world.
He will be replaced by Oliver Blume, who becomes the fourth VW CEO in six years.
Blume quietly set Porsche, the most profitable brand in the VW stable, on a path of financial success with a combination of revitalised favourites like the 911 range and the updated Boxster/Cayman duo, alongside success on the electric side with the Taycan line-up.
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With nearly 30 years of experience at VW, Blume will act as CEO of both companies, and is renowned for a more collaborative management style than his predecessor.
Given Blume’s [below] interest in alternative fuels – he signed off on the synthetic fuel project that will be built in Tasmania – it could potentially herald a change in VW’s future product strategy back towards ICE vehicles.
The Porsche IPO is still expected to go ahead later in 2022, and could raise upwards of A$160 billion for the company.
