Dirk Grosse-Loheide
The VW native has been Head of Purchasing at Audi since April, having previously been responsible for procurement on the brand board at Volkswagen.
(Photo: Volkswagen)
Volkswagen boss Oliver Blume is reorganizing the carmaker’s board of directors. The previous Audi purchasing manager, Dirk Große-Loheide, will take on this task for the entire group and for the VW brand, as the company announced on Tuesday. His predecessor, Murat Aksel, is moving to the commercial vehicle subsidiary MAN as Head of Purchasing.
Blume said that the reorganization will strengthen the purchasing function at group level and in two core areas. At the volume brand VW and at MAN, two top managers with experience in crises would be responsible for the central task in Grosse-Loheide and Aksel.
Große-Loheide will initially also continue to manage purchasing at Audi until his successor is settled. The VW native has been head of purchasing at the Ingolstadt premium subsidiary since April, having previously been responsible for procurement on the brand board at Volkswagen. He started his career in 1990 at Volkswagen in Wolfsburg.
Aksel has been responsible for purchasing on the Group Executive Board since January 2021. For him, the move to MAN is a return to his long-standing professional home in Munich, where he worked for BMW from 2009 to 2017, VW said.
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The task awaiting him at MAN is to secure the supply of parts in view of the tight supply chains for the ramp-up of heavy commercial vehicle production. Missing wiring harnesses from the Ukraine had given MAN a hard time after the Russian attack; the company had to shut down the tapes for weeks. The previous MAN purchasing manager Stefan Gramse is moving to Wolfsburg and will work there in a central position for VW.
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