The boss of VW, Martin Winterkorn, now 67, will be stepping down after 2016, and he’s now made it clear that his successor may not come from within.
He said “the decision about who will succeed me is not an easy one for the supervisory board,” adding that “a Volkswagen boss has to have a big affinity to our products. He needs to be close to customers and he needs to have a relationship with dealers.”
It’s also important that the candidate for the position is an engineer, as running the company is said to be a very complex matter indeed.
VW has already gone ahead and snapped up ex-BMW board member for development Herbert Diess, as well as Andreas Renschler, also a member of the board but at Daimler.
An internal candidate may still be proposed, though, and it could be the CEO of Porsche, Matthias Muller or Rupert Stadler from Audi, although the latter is said to be at a disadvantage for not having an engineering degree.
There’s still time to make a decision, as Winterkorn will reportedly stay on as CEO until 2019 (and the release of the next Golf) by direct request of Ferdinand Piech who currently serves as supervisory board chairman for the group.
Via Motoring
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