As head of the sports car manufacturer Porsche, Oliver Blume is currently having to deal with one setback after the next. The 56-year-old manager has just replaced the head of the China business in order to respond to problems in the People’s Republic. Now Porsche has overturned its business forecast, just one day before management presents its half-year figures this Wednesday. “When it rains, it pours”, loosely translated: Misfortune rarely comes alone. Analysts from Bernstein Research comment on the series of impacts that have “significantly clouded” the situation since Porsche went public almost two years ago. As Porsche announced on Tuesday, several suppliers are affected by a shortage of certain aluminum alloys. This could affect the sports car manufacturer’s production for several weeks and lead to standstills in the construction of “individual or multiple vehicle series,” according to a mandatory announcement. For the year as a whole, management now expects an operating return of between 14 and 15 percent instead of the previously targeted 15 to 17 percent. Sales are expected to be between 39 and 40 (previously: 40 to 42) billion euros. At the same time, Porsche is withdrawing its outlook for electric vehicles, whose share of deliveries should now be between 12 and 13 (13 to 15) percent. Investors reacted with shock. In the morning, Porsche AG’s share price fell by almost 8 percent. Later it was still 4 percent in the red. The share price of major shareholder Porsche SE also fell, although the holding company owned by the Porsche and Piëch families emphasized that it wanted to stick to its own business goals. Volkswagen said the delivery bottlenecks “currently have no direct impact on the production of vehicles from the group’s other brands.” VW holds the majority of shares in the sports car manufacturer Porsche. Blume runs both companies in parallel.Porsche does not provide details of affected suppliers in connection with storms in the canton of Valais. What is clear, however, is that the difficulties are related to storms that struck the Swiss canton of Valais at the beginning of July. There, rains caused the River Rhone to overflow its banks and flooded the factories of aluminum manufacturers Novelis and Constellium. Novelis supplies the metal wound into rolls, the coils, to Porsche’s direct suppliers. They process the material into sheets and press components that the sports car manufacturer uses in all model series. The incident raises further questions about “cluster risk management,” i.e. the control of purchasing that has made Porsche “so vulnerable to a critical supplier,” writes Bernstein Research. The analysts announced that they would “review” their assessment of Porsche after the half-year figures. The difficulties are putting further pressure on Blume, who is also struggling with problems in Wolfsburg, from software development to loss of market share in China to delayed launches of new models. The fact that problems are now piling up at the sports car manufacturer Porsche, which is used to success, highlights its dual role. This means that VW and Porsche have afforded themselves a “part-time chairman” and a “governance anomaly” that does not do justice to either company, was the recent criticism from investors at the general meetings post, although it may take some time until then. “He realizes that he has a hell of a job with the two functions,” it is said in supervisory board circles. “The situation is changing dramatically at the moment.” At the same time, it is clear that the Porsche and Piëch shareholder families support the current constellation and do not want to rush anything. It is said that the matter will not be addressed until next year or 2026 at the earliest. There is currently uncertainty throughout the entire automotive industry. In addition to China, whose car manufacturers are also pushing into Europe, the slow ramp-up of electromobility is causing problems. Porsche had also backed away from its electric car goals a few days ago, at least to some extent. So far, the sports car manufacturer wanted to deliver more than 80 percent of new cars with electric drives in 2030. Now it is said that Porsche “could” achieve this goal – “depending on customer demand and the development of electromobility in the world regions”. VW also emphasizes that it can react flexibly to any development in demand.
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