Photo: Autohaus.de
After the outgoing CEO of BMW, Dr. Nortber Reithofer, will leave his current position within the company, there’s an even bigger challenge waiting for him ahead. Ever since his replacement was announced in the persona of Mr. Harald Kruger, the Bavarian company announced that Mr. Reithofer will be given the position of Supervisory Board Chairman.
However, according to recent reports from Germany, not everybody is okay with this move. German publication Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung claims that German asset management company Union Investment that has a position on the board won’t back Mr. Reithofer.
Their claim is that his naming would break a custom that has been in place within BMW for quite some time now. According to them, a supervisory board chairman needs to be at a distance from the company’s management to be able to be constructive, objective and critical once in the new position.
However, since Reithofer is supposed to make the move as soon as his tenure as CEO is over, that would be impossible in his case. Unfortunately for Union Investment, they only have a stake of 0.7 percent of BMW shares and chances are they won’t be able to change much.
Even so, maybe others might pay more attention to the issue they are bringing up, and plans might get mixed up. After seeing what happened at Volkswagen not too long ago, things are getting more and more heated in the higher ranks of various companies.
The trouble is, the Quandt family, who backs Mr. Reithofer, owns 47 percent of BMW and overruling them would take a tremendous effort from the rest of the shareholders.
Their claim is that his naming would break a custom that has been in place within BMW for quite some time now. According to them, a supervisory board chairman needs to be at a distance from the company’s management to be able to be constructive, objective and critical once in the new position.
However, since Reithofer is supposed to make the move as soon as his tenure as CEO is over, that would be impossible in his case. Unfortunately for Union Investment, they only have a stake of 0.7 percent of BMW shares and chances are they won’t be able to change much.
Even so, maybe others might pay more attention to the issue they are bringing up, and plans might get mixed up. After seeing what happened at Volkswagen not too long ago, things are getting more and more heated in the higher ranks of various companies.
The trouble is, the Quandt family, who backs Mr. Reithofer, owns 47 percent of BMW and overruling them would take a tremendous effort from the rest of the shareholders.
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