You’ve really made an effort. Not only the colleagues in the management of the automotive supplier Mahle took time for the new boss Matthias Arleth (55) at the beginning of the year. The supervisory boards and employee representatives also welcomed him. Holidays were postponed, and even the rarely euphoric chief inspector Heinz Junker (72) praised the newcomer brought in by Webasto as an “expert for product development in future technologies and for transformation processes”.
The excitement didn’t last long. On April 30th Arleth had to go. The supplier, a heavyweight in the industry with 71,000 employees and 10.9 billion euros in sales, lost its third boss in just over four years. What remains is helplessness. Mahle will not emerge from the crisis.