FRANKFURT: Ferdinand Piech (pictured), a towering figure at Volkswagen for more than two decades, resigned as its chairman yesterday after losing a showdown with Chief Executive Martin Winterkorn.
Piech, the 78-year-old grandson of the inventor of the Volkswagen Beetle, had previously seen off other executives who crossed him, including his hand-picked successor as Volkswagen CEO, Bernd Pischetsrieder. But this time, he was unexpectedly isolated in a five-to-one vote of Volkswagen’s steering committee last week as labour representatives, the state of Lower Saxony and even his own cousin Wolfgang Porsche stood firmly behind Winterkorn.
“The members of the steering committee came to a consensus that, in the light of the past weeks, the mutual trust necessary for successful cooperation was no longer there,” the six-member panel said in a statement. “Against this background, Prof Doctor Ferdinand K Piech resigned from his office as chairman as well as all his supervisory board mandates within the group with immediate effect.”
The leadership row burst into the open when Der Spiegel quoted Piech, the patriarch of the family that owns 51 percent of voting rights in VW, as saying he had “distanced” himself from CEO Winterkorn.
Reuters
