That’s the problem with construction sites: they often end up being heavier and more complex than hoped. At the end of his first 100 days at the head of the Volkswagen group, Oliver Blume tried, at the end of 2022, to reassure: yes, it is necessary to “empty the cellar” and “overhaul the roof” of the ancestral house, but the “foundations are good”, he was positive. Roll on a new youth? Two years later, the chief architect can only note it: hit by the loss of competitiveness of the industry across the Rhine, the global decline of the automobile industry and Chinese competition, the German monument is still taking on water despite the savings plans already launched. Deutsche is in disarray.
No choice, fasten your seatbelts, you have to shift into second gear. Faced with an “extremely tense” situation, wrote the chairman of the board in an internal memo revealed by AFP, “factory closures (…) can no longer be ruled out”. Including in Germany, which would be a first in almost ninety years of history and a real national shock. At least, he cannot be accused of not innovating.
Also the boss of Porsche (since 2015) and a sports car fan, he is embarking on a particularly delicate turn. His predecessor, Herbert Diess, can testify to this: despite the accuracy of his strategic choices, his steering movements, deemed too violent internally, had ended up sending him to the side of the road. At 56 years old and after thirty years in the group, Oliver Blume, a mechanical engineer by training who joined Audi as an apprentice, will be able to rely on his solid knowledge of the very particular in-house governance. An asset but not a carte blanche, the powerful employees’ committee already promising him “fierce resistance”. The blows will rain down. Quick, a hard hat!
