The Aston Martin boss was abruptly replaced by a veteran Ferrari executive tasked with turbocharging his efforts to go electric.
Tobias Moers left the British company with immediate effect on Wednesday in a departure that executive chairman Lawrence Stroll said was by “mutual agreement”.
He was replaced by Amedeo Felisa, who was Ferrari’s chief executive from 2008 to 2016. Roberto Fedeli, another Ferrari veteran, will also join Aston next month as technical director.
It came as the company revealed pre-tax losses of £111m for the three months to March 31, compared with a loss of £42m a year earlier.
Mr Stroll – a Canadian billionaire who is Aston’s biggest shareholder – had previously denied he was planning to replace Mr Moers, whose management style is said by insiders to have ruffled the feathers of the company.
Mr Stroll said on Wednesday that Mr Moers had not been forced to leave and added that the change, including the separation of his two roles as managing director and technical director, was necessary for the next phase of growth of the company.
He said: “Tobias did a great job for me for phase one. We’ve always said this business is in phases.
“Going into phase two, I just want to have a dedicated CEO and a dedicated CTO. Both are full-time jobs and shouldn’t be split 50-50…and I had the opportunity to to have two of the greatest people in the business.
“I thank Tobias for the work he did, but we needed a different management team. We mutually agreed.”
Aston shares jumped 13% after the announcement.
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Source: www.telegraph.co.uk
This notice was published: 2022-05-04 19:00:23