It seems Volkswagen's Supervisory Board is keeping true to their promise holding more people accountable in the company's diesel crisis. Reuters (via Automotive News) and German publication Bild are reporting that three executives will be dismissed. The three are,

• Michael Horn, Volkswagen U.S. CEO
• Ulrich Hackenberg, Audi's r&d Boss
• Wolfgang Hatz, Porsche's engine chief
  

Porsche and Volkswagen in Germany declined to comment, while Audi couldn't be reached. A spokeswoman for Volkswagen of America declined to comment as well, but called the reports of Horn's exit 'speculation'.

 

Now if the reports are true, there will be one party not happy with the decision; Volkswagen's dealers in the U.S. Horn has earned the support of many dealers in the U.S.

 

“We as a dealer body would be in a disagreement with a leadership change at this critical time in the U.S. market,” said Alan Brown, chairman of Volkswagen’s national dealer council.

 

As for who will likely become the next CEO of Volkwagen, Reuters is reporting that Porsche CEO Matthias Mueller will get the nod. A source tells the news service that Mueller has the backing of the majority of Volkswagen's Supervisory Board.

 

Source: Automotive News (Subscription Required), Bild, Reuters

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Somewhere, in a supervillian lair high in the Alps, Ferdinand Piech is plotting his return.

Edited September 24, 201510 yr by El Kabong

And this is just the beginning of the Purge to dump high salary folks, restructure the company and purge excessive costs to get VW/Audi/Porsche even more profitable if done right.

As I've been reading through all the stuff about VW I've been wondering about the legal ramifications. And then I remembered this story from shortly before the emissions scandal. You know, where they were planning to split the company into different business units:

http://www.automobilemag.com/features/news/1506-report-volkswagen-group-may-split-into-four-holding-companies/

In hindsight it sure sounds like they knew what was about to unfold and wanted to minimize the damage, eh?

And it does appear that they knew WELL in advance. Like eight years in advance:

http://business.financialpost.com/news/transportation/volkswagen-warned-about-emission-cheating-software-eight-years-ago-leaked-documents-show

This is starting to look extremely bad.

WOW, thanks for posting the links to the stories, if Banks are putting a stop on funding of sales / leases and buying up VW auto loans / leases, this could be very hard for VW. On top of Bosch telling them this software would be legal for testing on R&D but not for production. Someone inside made a HUGE mistake.

 

OUCH! 

No worries man. It's becoming a pretty complex story. At first I thought it might be out of the headlines in a few weeks, but I'm beginning to think this sucker's got legs.

As regards the funding issues: this may be an opportunity for GM, via Opel, to get an "in" via tech-sharing or an ownership stake. The European market is stagnant, and if you're going to make any headway conquest appears to be the only real way.

Edited September 28, 201510 yr by El Kabong

Agreed, this could be the opening GM needs to grow Opel into a profitable auto group.

After giving it some more thought, this might turn out to be Sergio Marchionne's early Christmas gift, especially after Herr Piech was shown the door.

Aaaaaaaaaand... Audi just got hammered as well.

http://autoweek.com/article/car-news/audi-admits-21-million-cars-affected-emissions-cheating-software

Aaaaaaaaaand... Audi just got hammered as well.

http://autoweek.com/article/car-news/audi-admits-21-million-cars-affected-emissions-cheating-software

Hahaha Ouchy!

 

Part of me feels bad about it, part of me thinks "sneaky, I like the attempt", and part of me things they are just absolutely retarded and deserve every punishment that comes their way.

If it was a situation where they were using every last tool in their technological bag of tricks and fell short I'd feel a bit bad for them, in a Charlie Brown kind of way.

But they never even TRIED to use urea. I just don't understand why not!

Money, Money is always the reason why.

Aaaaaaaaaand... Audi just got hammered as well.

http://autoweek.com/article/car-news/audi-admits-21-million-cars-affected-emissions-cheating-software

 

Yup, Bloomberg is reporting 2.1 million auto's affected by Audi!

 

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-09-28/audi-says-2-1-million-diesel-cars-affected-by-emissions-software