German CEO must make Aston Mar

The Aston Martin DBX. Image: Supplied

German CEO must make Aston Martin profitable again

The iconic British luxury car brand is in trouble. But a new boss could save it.

German CEO must make Aston Mar

The Aston Martin DBX. Image: Supplied

The car company most closely associated with James Bond, has posted significant losses for 2020.

Aston Martin entered the year in financial trouble and the disruption to the global health pandemic has made things even worst, with a R3.6 billion loss.

Revenues are down by nearly two thirds and the company only sold 1 770 cars for the first six months of 2020, compared to 2996 units during the same period last year.

Selling too many cars can be a problem for exclusive brands such as Aston Martin, but it needs to recover some of its sales momentum to ensure that development cost R&D is provided for.

ASTON MARTIN DBX

In theory Aston Martin should trend towards much better financial health, as it has finally managed to launch its own luxury SUV, the DBX.

A first for Aston Martin, the DBX has potential to be much more popular in markets such as Russia, Indian and China than the brand’s traditional low-riding sportscars.

LAWRENCE STROLL: HUGE MANAGEMENT CHANGES

Despite significant challenges, Aston Martin is positioning itself for recovery.

The company has seen enormous changes at board and management level, including the appointment of a Canadian chairman and German CEO.

Aston Martin is always considered to be British to a fault, but the brand’s most successful period (2000 to 2013), was under the direction of a German, Ulrich Bez.

Cash is a desperate resource for Aston Martin, and it has been refinanced by Canadian billionaire, Lawrence Stroll, who is father of the F1 driver, Lance.

With a proven business acumen, Stroll has no qualm about making unpopular decisions – required for the future health of Aston Martin. This has led him to depose CEO Andy Palmer, replacing the English boss with a German, Tobias Moers.

This could be an inspired move as Aston Martin needs a CEO who understands the engineering complexity of producing high-performance vehicles. Moers is perhaps the industry’s most qualified candidate for the task of rescuing Aston Martin, as he spend three decades at Mercedes-Benz’s wildly successful AMG division.

The challenge for Moers is enormous, but his tenure at AMG proved that when it comes to running a profitable sportscar company, there are few automotive industry CEOs more capable.