Double gearbox at the top in the automotive world: the novelties come from the companies Renault-Nissan and Opel. Karl-Thomas Neumann, CEO of Opel, is leaving with immediate effect, the German company that General Motors sold to the French PSA Peugeot Citroen. This was announced by Opel, specifying that Neumann will be replaced by Chief Financial Officer, Michael Lohscheller, appointed today by the supervisory board. "Lohscheller becomes the new head of Opel, said the house of Ruesselheim adding that Neumann, in command of Opel since 2013, 'presented his resignation today".
However, Neumann will remain a member of the Opel board until the formalization of the sale of the German group to PSA, expected by the autumn. According to industry sources cited by the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, Neumann considers integration with the PSA to be right from a strategic point of view, but is worried that the French do not fully understand the effectiveness of electromobility. Neumann was aiming to make Opel an electric car manufacturer. Furthermore, the newspaper states, there was no feeling between Neumann and PSA number one, Carlos Tavares.
Reversal also arriving at home Renault-Nissan, the Franco-Japanese group which holds together Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi and which in 2016 it sold 10 million vehicles worldwide. The shareholders' meeting is scheduled for Thursday 16 June, during which, according to rumors reported by Le Monde, the succession of Carlos Ghosn, the current chairman and chief executive officer, should take shape, but he intends to step away and leave the task of defining the strategic plan to 2022 to another operational manager, which according to many will be the first "after-Ghosn". The choice should fall on a candidate within the group.
