Recently, Volkswagen announced the appointment of Ralf Brandstaetter as the new CEO of Volkswagen brand. He officially took office on July 1st, succeeding Herbert Diess, who remains CEO of Volkswagen Group.
According to CNBC, after taking office, Ralf Brandstaetter will lead Volkswagen to cut costs at its largest factory in Germany, and use the saved funds for autonomous driving and battery procurement. The investment plan for autonomous driving requires 34 billion euros, and battery procurement requires 50 billion euros.
After Diess stepped down as brand CEO, he will be responsible for operating Volkswagen’s other brands, including Audi, Bentley, Skoda, Lamborghini, and Porsche, etc. In addition to the brand CEO, Volkswagen retained all of Diess’s responsibilities at Volkswagen passenger cars. In addition, the restructuring of the management team this time will also lead to the departure of Stefan Sommer, head of procurement and parts.
It is reported that in the early stages of preparing for mass production of ID.3, due to software failures, Diess was under tremendous pressure. The total estimated number of vehicles with problems reached 20,000, such as the emergency call system “e-call” of the eighth-generation Golf, which intermittently failed to work properly.
ID.3 is particularly critical for Volkswagen to meet more stringent European emission regulations, so whether the ID.3 project can be successfully promoted is particularly important internally.
As for why Ralf Brandstaetter was chosen as the new brand CEO, according to The Detroit News, he played an important role and made outstanding contributions while serving as Volkswagen’s head of operations for the brand.
About Ralf Brandstaetter_20200609113852.jpg)
In October 2015, Herbert Diess was appointed as the CEO of Volkswagen AG.
In December 2015, Herbert Diess became a member of the Executive Board of Volkswagen AG responsible for Procurement.
On December 10, 2015, Herbert Diess was appointed as a member of the Volkswagen Brand Board of Management responsible for “Procurement”.
On August 1, 2018, Herbert Diess assumed the role of CEO of the Volkswagen brand.
About Herbert Diess
Herbert Diess was born in Munich on October 24th, 1958. He studied Vehicle Technology at the Technical University of Munich from 1977 to 1978, and Mechanical Engineering at the University of Munich from 1978 to 1983.
After receiving his engineering degree, Diess became a scientific assistant at the Institute for Machine Tools and Factory Management of the Technical University of Munich and obtained his doctorate in the field of assembly automation in 1987.
Starting from 1988, Diess became head of the Assembly Automation Division at the Technical University of Munich.
In 1996, Herbert Diess joined BMW Group as Head of Structural Analysis. He was later assigned to the UK and assumed the role of Managing Director of the BMW’s Plant in Birmingham in 1999. A year later, he became head of the BMW’s Oxford Plant.
In 2003, Herbert Diess was appointed as Director of BMW Motorcycles.
In 2007, Diess became a member of the BMW executive board responsible for Purchasing and Supplier Network. In 2012, he was appointed as a member of the BMW executive board responsible for Development.
On July 1st, 2015, the Supervisory Board of Volkswagen AG appointed Herbert Diess as a member of the Board of Management of Volkswagen AG and Chairman of the Board of Management of the Volkswagen Passenger Cars brand.
On April 12th, 2018, Herbert Diess took over from Matthias Mueller as the CEO of Volkswagen Group.
This article is a translation by ChatGPT of a Chinese report from 42HOW. If you have any questions about it, please email bd@42how.com.