BREAKING: Pich Resigns Chairmanship, Winterkorn Continues as CEO at VW

Mark Stevenson
by Mark Stevenson

While Chief Executive Martin Winterkorn wears bruises from the conflict, Ferdinand Piëch has paid the ultimate of price and resigned his chairmanship with immediate effect.

According to Reuters, the ongoing row between CEO and Chairman at Volkswagen eased this past week, but when the group’s supervisory board put their support behind Winterkorn, the 78-year-old grandson of Ferry Porsche was left “isolated” in a five-to-one vote. Sources told the newswire service Piëch’s decision to not support Winterkorn put his own position in jeopardy. Piëch’s wife, Ursula, also resigned her positions within the company.

Piëch will be replaced by Deputy Chairman Berthold Huber in the interim. A vote on when a new Chairman will be chosen has not been announced.

Mark Stevenson
Mark Stevenson

More by Mark Stevenson

Comments
Join the conversation
10 of 52 comments
  • Zerofoo Zerofoo on Apr 25, 2015

    Until VWs can go 150,000 miles on reasonably priced scheduled maintenance they will never succeed in the US market. Too many other car companies are priced right, have great warranties and nice interiors. VW simply can not play the "German handling" card and expect their customers to foot the bill for their complicated and finicky machines. Build simple, cheap, reliable cars that aren't penalty boxes on wheels and warranty them for 80,000 miles. That's the only way to succeed in the US market.

    • See 5 previous
    • HerrKaLeun HerrKaLeun on Apr 26, 2015

      @HerrKaLeun What you are saying moving the engine upfront caused the CV joint problem, but not water-cooling it. I think introducing cheap design and parts along with FWD caused the problems, not the front or water-cooled motor itself. Every year some 50 million cars with water-cooled and front engine are produced with perfectly fine CV joints.

  • MrCharlieWhyoming MrCharlieWhyoming on Apr 26, 2015

    He's got 80,000 problems but Range Rover ain't one of em.

  • Volt 230 Volt 230 on Apr 26, 2015

    He was disgusted by the fact that VW's superior German engineering could not copy Hyundai's silent steering column adjustment that he marveled at a few yrs back at some auto show.

  • Motormouth Motormouth on Apr 27, 2015

    This could really be a bloody shame for VW - and for the automotive landscape as a whole. Without Piech pushing through the Phaeton and Veyron, they probably wouldn't have happened. Now the bean counters are well and truly in charge, there'll be no more vanity projects and the world will probably be a worse place without them.

Next