Stellantis chief behind Luton van closure decision quits

The European car boss who ordered the closure of the Luton van factory last week is to leave his job with immediate effect.
Carlos Tavares, the chief executive of Stellantis, has been under pressure for months over the worsening performance of the €36 billion international automotive group which includes Vauxhall in the UK, along with Peugeot, Citroen, Fiat, Chrysler and Jeep.
Last night the company announced that Tavares, 66, was leaving after what appears to have been a spectacular fallout between him and the group’s chairman, John Elkann, a scion of the super-rich Agnelli family, the founders of Fiat, who are the single largest shareholder in Stellantis.
In a statement the company said that it had “accepted the resignation … with immediate effect” of Tavares.
Henri de Castries, the former boss of the French insurance group Axa who is the senior independent director of Stellantis, said: “Stellantis’s success since its creation has been rooted in a perfect alignment between the … shareholders, the board and the chief executive officer.
“However, in recent weeks different views have emerged which have resulted in the board and the chief executive coming to today’s decision.”
Stellantis has been in turmoil for months. For the third quarter of the year it reported a 20 per cent collapse in sales volumes and a €12 billion reduction in revenues, and heads have been rolling in various senior roles as Tavares sought to shore up his position.
Tavares has been publicly lashing out at governments’ tough electric car sales targets, saying that they are coming too fast for his company to meet them without falling into losses. Yet at the same time Stellantis is in the middle of a €3 billion return to shareholders through a share buyback.
His public spat with the UK government and its zero emission vehicle mandate prompted, he said, his decision to shut the Vauxhall Vivaro van plant in Luton, putting 1,000 jobs under threat. The company said it was retrenching to its electric van-making plant in Ellesmere Port which Tavares only kept open during the pandemic after negotiating tens of millions of pounds of UK taxpayer handouts from Kwasi Kwarteng when he was business secretary.
Stellantis shares dropped more than 8 per cent on Monday to €11.46 and have fallen 43 per cent over the past year.
Analysts at Jefferies said: “Although not a surprise, the early and immediate departure of chief executive Carlos Tavares leaves the group without leadership at a time of critical decisions on 1) brand management to reverse market share loss and 2) excess industrial capacity in Europe and North America.”
Elkann is to head an interim committee that will take over from Tavares until a new chief executive is found. Analysts expect that given Elkann’s track record, the search will be broader than the car industry.