The former VW brand manager Herbert Diess is to rise to the head of the car company – and could be more powerful than its predecessor. According to SPIEGEL information, he wants to continue with the group and the important brand VW on. Actually, group and brand management at Volkswagen have been separated so far.
Now Diess’ might even grow even further, because he wants to pick up on an old idea again and bundle VW’s brands in groups.
That Diess could get so much power is surprising. Just a few months ago, the manager had a serious dispute with Volkswagen’s powerful employee leader Bernd Osterloh on the restructuring of the core brand VW.
The idea of leading Europe’s leading automaker and, as it were, part-time job, its most important brand, VW, had already been the former VW boss Martin Winterkorn once implemented – and had been heavily criticized for it. Winterkorn actually took on the task of having to handle so many tasks at the same time. Therefore, his successor left Matthias Müller the job at the VW brand in 2015 the former BMW manager Herbert Diess. He wants – there Müller leached by the quarrels about the diesel scandal left the group , – again the whole power, but a little smarter.
“This wants to do both, corporate and VW brand, so he wants to be able to develop the important brand directly,” it says from supervisory board circles. “However, he wants to have an operative management board on the brand side, which keeps his back in day-to-day business.”
It is by no means certain that the plan will go through this way. The approval of the Supervisory Board, which meets on Friday, is still missing.
Four new brand groups planned
If the former BMW manager succeeds in his coup, he will probably win even more penetration power than at first sight. For at the same time, the Supervisory Board also wants to talk about a completely new corporate structure: VW’s brands are to be divided into four groups, told the SPIEGEL from the group. This is now also up for debate and can be decided at short notice, if the personalities would not bring too much discussion with it.
- A volume group should the brands VW, Skoda and Seat bundle up
- in a Premium group should Audi stand,
- a sports car group with the project name “Super Premium” should Porsche . Bugatti, Bentley and Lamborghini include,
- a Commercial Vehicle Holding the trucks and smaller commercial vehicles of the group.
Years ago, Winterkorn and Betriebsratschef Osterloh had already considered such a model. They wanted to be able to better control the global corporation with its dozen brands and around 600,000 employees. It has never been reality. Even now, it should still provide for discussion, it is said – especially since even Diess’ access to the VW brand conflicted mountains.
“The suggestion of Diess will be discussed controversially,” said from the Supervisory Board. Important supporters but Diess already has: The powerful works council leader Bernd Osterloh and the owners clans of Porsches and Piëchs supported the plans, it says from the group. However, the spokesman for VW, the owners clan and the works council did not want to comment on the information.
If Diess can now draw the country representatives of Lower Saxony on his side, nothing stands in the way of his plan. At present, neither side of the supervisory board can succeed, neither the Porsche Piëch clan nor Osterloh, nor Lower Saxony. They would have to forge alliances.
DPA
The powerful: Wolfgang Porsche (left), spokesman for the owner family, Lower Saxony’s chief executive Stephan Weil (2nd from left), works council chief Bernd Osterloh (right) – with VW CEO Matthias Müller in their midst.
Works council chief Osterloh shows his power
However, Osterloh is now gaining power in the new constellation. Because his longtime Colleague Gunnar Kilian, currently Secretary General of the Works Council, is to become the new Chief Human Resources Officer and replace the hard-hitting Karlheinz Blessing with Osterloh. Then the workers’ leader at Volkswagen would also have unprecedented power – because now he negotiates about jobs in the group with a loyal one.
Even now, however, no one in the group over at Osterloh. “No one here installs a board, if the works council is not well-disposed to him,” says an insider who has already experienced many debates at the top of the group.
That should affect soon also on another personnel. A new China boss must be sought. The former manager at the post, Jochem Heizmann, is about to resign, the SPIEGEL learned from group circles. It has been discussed internally for quite some time, because Heizmann was 66 years old at the beginning of the year and his contract expires.
imago / Susanne Hübner
China boss Jochem Heizmann
But the Chinese VW partner FAW had insisted on the fact that the manager remains China’s board at VW, because there were problems and recalls, especially in transmissions, says an engineer. Now the worst is over. Heizmann would be replaced, confirmed a person from the supervisory board environment. A successor was not yet found, but could come from the commercial sector.