Audi CEO replaced after carmaker's disappointing performance

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Volkswagen replaced the chief executive officer of its flagging premium brand Audi as Europe’s biggest carmaker seeks to keep up in the electric-car race and reverse a sales slide in China. 

VW insider Gernot Döllner will take over leadership of the label from Markus Duesmann in September, Audi said Thursday, confirming an earlier Bloomberg report.

The move comes after Oliver Blume, who’s been leading Europe’s biggest carmaker for less than a year, earlier this month singled out Audi as falling short of its potential when he outlined a host of measures to improve performance across the group. Tesla outsold Audi in the first quarter.

Duesmann, 54, has led Audi — VW’s cash cow alongside Porsche — since 2021. During the former BMW executive’s tenure, the brand for a time led VW’s ill-fated software efforts that have delayed key models, leading to tensions with Porsche over a future joint vehicle platform with Audi. Blume, who also helms Porsche, late last year axed Audi’s prestigious self-driving vehicle because of slow progress.  

"Audi slipped a bit in terms product promises and product concept compared to Mercedes or BMW," said Philippe Houchois, global auto analyst at Jefferies. "Audi’s lineup had aged, and Duesmann was under pressure for some time."

In Döllner, Audi is tapping a former Porsche executive who has worked alongside Blume across a 30-year career at VW. He currently leads strategy for the group.

Blume, who started his career as a trainee at Audi, is trying to inject more urgency into VW’s efforts to keep up in the electric-car and digital transition. At the top of his agenda is execution and product delivery — usually VW mainstays — after predecessor Herbert Diess’s costly EV investments and software plans ran into trouble. The company is facing an alarming erosion of market share in China after software glitches irked customers and competitors pulled ahead with more attractive EV models. The Asian country is VW and Audi’s biggest market.

The brand’s global deliveries have slipped for three consecutive years to 1.61 million last year, the lowest since 2013. In the first three months of this year, Tesla pulled ahead with 422 875 vehicles to Audi’s 415 684 units.

Audi’s troubles began as early as 2015, when it surfaced that VW had rigged diesel vehicles with devices to cheat on emissions tests. The scandal sparked years-long probes at Audi and Porsche, weighing on investor confidence and haunting their EV efforts. Earlier this week, a Munich court convicted former Audi boss Rupert Stadler for fraud in Germany’s first criminal verdict over the affair.

Duesmann’s departure is the latest in a string of management shakeups as Blume makes his mark on the sprawling German carmaker, which is known for its executive infighting and power struggles. Last year, he shrank VW’s bloated management board, removing the sales and procurement positions. He also installed a new lead for the struggling Cariad software unit.

Audi has seen several executive changes in the past years, including on the key development chief position. Hildegard Wortmann, Audi’s head of sales, lost her position on VW’s management board in September after being promoted by Diess in 2021.