A dry press release confirmed, on Sunday, December 1, at 8:40, the information released an hour earlier by the Bloomberg news agency: Carlos Tavares, Stellantis’s CEO, is leaving the automotive group “with immediate effect.” A board meeting was held in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and unanimously decided on the executive’s departure, according to a French source.
The 66-year-old boss, who left the world’s fourth-largest automaker, its 14 brands and 250,000 employees, wanted to see out his term in January 2026. He had no choice but to resign. The amount of the compensation, provided for in his contract, has not yet been revealed. John Elkann, president of the board of directors and representative of the Agnelli family, the company’s largest shareholder, thanked the man who created Stellantis by bringing PSA and Fiat Chrysler together in 2021 for “setting us on the path to becoming a global leader in our industry,” according to the press release. That was all.
The name of his successor has not been announced. And for good reason: They have not yet been chosen. Elkann, 48, will take over as interim CEO, at the head of a revamped executive committee. The composition of this temporary committee has not been communicated. “The process to appoint the new permanent Chief Executive Officer is well underway, managed by a Special Committee of the Board,” the press release stated, “and will be concluded within the first half of 2025.”
This process began at the end of September. According to information we received, two candidates are being considered internally: Maxime Picat, the French director of purchasing, after having led the group’s European activities, and Antonio Filosa, the Italian-Brazilian head of Jeep, appointed director of North American activities in October. There may also be external candidates.
What precipitated the Stellantis board’s decision, given that, in an interview with French business newspaper Les Echos, Tavares claimed on October 13 to “have the unanimous support of the board and its president” to “sprint to 2026” and complete his term of office? He would then have turned 68, “a good age to retire” and finally satisfy “a request from his wife,” as he had told the press a few days earlier.
Long-term versus sprinting
More than for his performance as a boss, it seems that Tavares fell because of his methods – maximum pressure on teams, radical decisions and brutal dismissals. The shareholders’ decision to part ways with the eminent boss – who turned around the ailing PSA and Opel and successfully completed the merger with Fiat – was not prompted by a further deterioration in the group’s results. On the contrary, “Stellantis confirms the guidance it presented to the financial community on October 31, 2024,” the press release pointed out.
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