Skip to main content

Ferdinand Piëch Peels Away From the Family Business

After an extended battle with his family, Ferdinand Piëch has finally acquiesced to resign from the board of Porsche Automobil Holding SE and sell off his remaining shares. At 80 years of age, leaving VW Group’s parent company was probably long overdue for Piëch, but you can’t help but wonder if the manner in which his retirement unfolded hasn’t left him bitter.

Still, with his 14.7 percent stake rumored to be worth over a billion euros, he’ll have the means to stage the most elaborate revenge any of us could possibly imagine — assuming that’s what he intends.

Piëch’s retirement is official. Porsche SE announced it Wednesday, saying “Ferdinand K. Piëch, as part of the completion of the aforementioned assignments today, has resigned from his office as member of the Supervisory Board of Porsche Automobil Holding SE with effect as of 8 December 2017.”

The road to this point has been particularly ugly and actions taken resulted in some exceptionally sour gapes among the Piëch and Porsche families. Ferdinand resigned from VW Group after losing a power struggle with his former protege, then-CEO Martin Winterkorn, that would have made even the darkest Sith Lord wince. Already from a competitive ancestry and a black sheep to boot, Piëch was infamous for being savagely competitive — allegedly saying to the rest of his family, “I am a wild boar. You are domestic pigs,” in an attempt to highlight that he was driven by conquest while they were not.

That attitude helped him develop Audi into the brand it is today and, ultimately, brought great success to VW Group as a whole. Despite making his extended family even more wealthy than they were before, Piëch took heat for “intentionally sabotaging” Porsche’s takeover of VW.

Following the public disclosure of Volkswagen’s emissions scandal, Piëch was believed to have intentionally incriminated the supervisory board and his cousin, Wolfgang Porsche, to the Brunswick state attorney’s office in Germany. He said the board had been made aware of the illegal manipulation of diesel exhaust gasses months before the official disclosure. The matter drove an even deeper wedge between Ferdinand and the rest of the family.

There is reason to believe him, too. According to Automotive News, Piëch’s self-claimed priorities were, “Volkswagen, family and money — in that order.”

Ferdinand’s departure makes room on the board for younger members of the Porsche-Piëch clan. Josef Ahorner, chairman and primary shareholder the Emarsys marketing platform, is seen as the most likely replacement for his uncle. But I’d rather see Piëch stick around and continue mixing it up with his kooky relatives.

A version of this story first appeared on thetruthaboutcars.com

The post Ferdinand Piëch Peels Away From the Family Business appeared first on VWVortex.



from VWVortex http://ift.tt/2hpjCAf
via IFTTT
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: Saying Goodbye to the CC V6

For all its size and its global reach, Volkswagen is still, in many ways, a deeply human company. There was, for instance, the Bugatti Veyron an ego project if ever there was one. Then the purchase of Ducati, a move most called folly. And then there was the Phaeton, the Volkswagen that most folks can’t afford. Not only were these moves all strange, I’m sure that they made VW’s accountants furious. None of them made good business sense, but they were all deeply interesting and they all are evidence of the heart that beats at the center of VW. Among these follies is the CC, a car that everyone agrees is rakishly handsome, but that no one really wanted to buy. The car couldn’t last, but the world is brighter for its having been in it. With the approach debut of the Arteon, it seems like a good time to look back on its sadly departing predecessor. The version I drove, because I live in Canada, is a V6 Wolfsburg Edition, which apparently isn’t available in the States. Nor is the V6, not as...
Post a Comment
Read more

T-Prime Makes World Premiere at Beijing

[ See image gallery at www.vwvortex.com ] The SUV segment is one of the fastest growing segments in the world and Volkswagen is showing the world how to do it. With the new T-Prime Concept GTE that was revealed today, the company is showing off all of the technology you can look for in its coming models. The T-Prime is a full-size hybrid SUV that can go up to 31 miles on a charge and gets 87 mpg. The hybrid power station is good for 375 hp and 516 lb/ft of torque and puts the power down with 4MOTION all wheel drive. It’ll get you up to 60 in six seconds. The concept’s real party piece, though, is its interior, which features exclusively touch, gesture, and voice controls. Everything from the infotainment, to the display, and even the gears are controlled by touch-screen. The T-Prime Concept GTE is bigger than the Touareg, and design elements are likely to find their way into all of their SUVs, of which there will be many. Volkswagen is also announcing that they expect to make an S...
Post a Comment
Read more

Audi Teases the e-tron’s Headlights Ahead of LA Reveal

Audi will unveil its new electric car, the e-tron GT, in just a few short days, but until then, it will do what manufacturers can’t help but do and will tease it mercilessly. The latest teaser images first appeared on Germany’s Bild , and feature some of the EV’s lighting. While the taillights look reasonably familiar, albeit on an interesting, angular surface, the headlights feature a heretofore unseen light shape. The X-shape (or maybe an R-shape, from the right angle) in the middle of the e-tron GT’s headlights set it apart from the rest of the lineup, even the e-tron SUV (whose lights look R8-ish with their angular check-shaped top line.) #Sneak Peek: the #Audi #etron GT concept – stay tuned for the big #world #premiere on November 28. pic.twitter.com/NIg0z6bIwR — AUDI AG (@Audi_Press) November 25, 2018 The long and low sedan will be based on the same platform as the Porsche Taycan, which is said to hit 60 mph in just 3.5 seconds and whose batteries will all be stowed...
Post a Comment
Read more