Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares has stepped down, the company announced on Dec. 1.
His resignation comes less than two months after Stellantis said Tavares would leave the company in 2026, after his current contract expires.
In its latest announcement, Stellantis cited “different views” between its board and Tavares as one of the reasons for his sudden departure.
Stellantis has been on the lookout for a potential successor to Tavares since at least September, and the company, in its latest announcement, said the search will be concluded within the first half of 2025. In the meantime, Stellantis will be run by an interim executive team led by Chairman John Elkann, a member of the Agnelli family, whose Exor holding company owns roughly 14.4% of Stellantis.
Tavares, who spent much of his career working at Nissan under Carlos Ghosn, has served as Stellantis’ CEO since the company was formed in 2021 from the merger of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and France’s PSA Group. He managed to make some efficiency improvements across the company’s 14 brands following the merger, and thanks to strong sales in the rebound following the pandemic, Tavares in 2023 saw his total compensation rise 56% to almost $40 million. However, he came under fire this year after Stellantis reported a 48% decline in net profits for the second quarter year-over-year.
The company has since reported a drop in global deliveries of 20% for the third quarter year-over-year. When announcing the third-quarter results, Stellantis cited a slowdown in Europe and planned inventory reductions in the U.S. as reasons for the reduced deliveries.
To turn the ship around, Stellantis plans further cost cuts, including cutting around 4,000 factory and 400 white-collar jobs in the U.S. Stellantis also last week announced plans to close a van factory in the U.K.
Stellantis also plans approximately 20 new product launches in the coming months, many of them in the U.S. The list includes the redesigned Dodge Charger, the Jeep Wagoneer S, and the Ram 1500 REV and 1500 Ramcharger. New generations of Jeep’s Compass and Cherokee are also just around the corner, together with the electric Recon off-roader and an electric Jeep Renegade that is expected to start at less than $25,000.
This article was originally published by Motor Authority, an editorial partner of ClassicCars.com