Nissan announces new executive committee members after COO exit

Nissan announced new members of an executive committee following the departure of COO Ashwani Gupta, seeking to consolidate management under CEO Makoto Uchida.

Nissan appointed Guillaume Cartier, currently chair of the management committee for Africa, Middle East, India, Europe and Oceania regions, Jeremie Papin, chair of the Americas, and Shohei Yamazaki, who leads China, as members of the committee, which looks after business operations and production development. They will report directly to Uchida starting July 1, the Yokohama-based carmaker said in a statement on Wednesday.

In addition, Ivan Espinosa, senior vice-president for global product planning & global program management will also become a member of the executive committee and will expand his scope to include global motor sports, according to the statement. 

After its annual shareholders’ meeting on Tuesday, Nissan announced appointees for corporate officers and the board, but there was no mention of a COO, indicating that the Japanese automaker has decided to discard the role for a while. Earlier this month, Nissan said Gupta was stepping down after a three-and-a-half year stint.

In a report earlier this month, the Financial Times said that Gupta was ousted after clashing with Uchida, and for his stance during negotiations to rebalance the partnership between Nissan and Renault, the Japanese carmaker’s biggest shareholder. Gupta had pushed back against the French carmaker’s efforts to license hundreds of jointly developed patented technologies to other players and its efforts to secure a commitment from Nissan to invest in its EV subsidiary, according to the newspaper.

Renault’s management is optimistic that Gupta’s departure from Nissan is likely to speed up efforts to rebalance their decades-long alliance and could potentially lead to a final agreement by the end of the summer, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg.

Regarding Wednesday’s line up, Uchida said: “In response to the constantly evolving market conditions, we will introduce a flatter and agile leadership structure, which will further empower regional and functional leadership.”

Cartier, a Frenchman who started his career at Nissan in 1995, has taken roles such as vice-president of sales operations at Nissan Automotive Europe in the past. In between, he also joined Mitsubishi in 2017, soon after former chairman Carlos Ghosn added the carmaker to the alliance between Nissan and Renault. 

Papin, also a Frenchman, started his career in Nissan as a financial adviser at Amsterdam-based joint venture Renault-Nissan BV. In the past Papin has overseen corporate strategy and business development at Renault and took roles such as vice-chair of the management committee and CFO at Nissan North America.

Yamazaki joined Nissan in 1992 and his past experiences include being vice-president of Alliance Global, as well as senior GM at Dongfeng Nissan Passenger Vehicle, a business unit of DFL, Nissan’s joint venture with Dongfeng Motor Group.

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