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Speculation about the future of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles has increased dramatically over the past week with reports first suggesting Jeep could be sold to a Chinese automaker and now reports that Alfa Romeo and Maserati could be spun off into a stand alone company. The various reports have been prompted, in part, by recent comments made by Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne and an awareness that a five-year plan put in place in 2014 will come to an end next year and its future after that includes everything ranging from a sale of some brands to a sale of the entire company. Detroit Free Press staff
Sergio Marchionne, CEO of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, answers a question during a press conference at the 2018 North American International Auto Show in Detroit on January 15, 2018.
(Photo: JEWEL SAMAD, AFP/Getty Images)
The future for Fiat Chrysler Automobiles after Chief Executive Officer Sergio Marchionne retires will apparently not be clarified until next year.
At the company’s annual general meeting Friday in Amsterdam, Marchionne said his successor will not be named until 2019, according to the company.
There had been speculation the future leadership face of FCA could be revealed earlier, possibly during an investor day event planned for June. Marchionne has said he plans to retire after this year.
News from the meeting reinforced the expectation that the company plans to name a successor for Marchionne, who became CEO of Fiat in 2004, from within the company’s ranks.
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Reuters reported that board Chairman John Elkann said that internal candidates are “up to the job.” The news service noted that Marchionne said he offered specific encouragement as “part of the development of a leader” to a member of FCA’s Group Executive Council, Alfredo Altavilla, to become part of an activist investor’s slate of board candidates for an Italian telecommunications company.
It’s not clear if that was a hint about Marchionne’s preferred successor, but Altavilla, who is also FCA’s chief operating officer for Europe, Africa and Middle East, has long been assumed as a contender to follow Marchionne. Others include Chief Financial Officer Richard Palmer and Jeep and Ram brand chief Mike Manley.
An FCA spokesman said the context of Marchionne’s comment was “also saying we view these types of roles as leadership development for executives in general.”
The future of the company after Marchionne has prompted considerable speculation. A Bloomberg report this week said his exit “may open the door” to a merger. The company had long been viewed as ripe for some type of deal, from a tie-up with another automaker to a sale possibly focused on important brands such as Jeep and Ram, but Marchionne pushed back against much of that speculation at this year’s North American International Auto Show in Detroit.
However, subsequent media reports said the company had been involved in talks with China’s Geely, which opted instead to buy a stake in Germany’s Daimler.
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Aside from talk about succession, the meeting also brought forward the potential that shareholders could see a dividend if the company reaches its goal of having net industrial cash of $4.9 billion ($4 billion euros) by the end of the year.
In addition, Marchionne and Elkann were reelected as executive directors of the company, and one new non-executive director, John Abbott of Royal Dutch Shell, was added to the board.
Contact Eric D. Lawrence: elawrence@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter: @_ericdlawrence.
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