AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)06/28 Report--

According to the German Business Daily, the BMW Group will call a board of directors at the Spartanburg plant in South Carolina from July 18 to 19 to discuss the fate or retention of Chairman Kruger, whose term will end in May 2020. According to the usual practice, German companies usually communicate one year before the expiration of the period on whether to extend the contracts of board members.

Kruger joined the BMW Group in 1992 and served as a director from December 2008 to June 2012, mainly responsible for human resources management, and from April 2012 to March 2013, mainly responsible for MINI, motorcycle, Rolls-Royce and after-sales service. In April 2013, he became a director in charge of production. In May 2015, Kruger officially took over as chairman of the BMW Group, becoming the youngest leader of a large carmaker.

Like other carmakers, BMW is facing a costly transformation, not only in electric cars, but also in new business models. After a decade of leading the luxury car market, BMW Group's momentum waned in 2016. Earlier, Bloomberg reported that some members of the supervisory board of BMW Group questioned whether Kruger was the right leader.

In 2018, both profit and revenue of BMW Group declined, with total revenue of 97.48 billion euros, down 0.8% from the same period last year, and net profit of 7.207 billion euros, down 16.9% from the same period last year.

In the first quarter of 2019, BMW delivered 605333 BMW, MINI and Rolls-Royce cars in the global market, up 0.1% from 604629 in the same period last year, setting a new sales record. In addition, the group's first-quarter revenue reached 22.46 billion euros, which was basically the same as that of 22.665 billion euros in the same period last year. However, there has been a sharp decline in profits. BMW's revenue was 22.462 billion euros, down 0.9% from a year earlier, while net profit was 589 million euros, down 74.2% from a year earlier. Among them, BMW's auto division posted a loss of 310 million euros for the first time since 2009.

BMW believes that the sharp decline in profits in the first quarter is mainly due to recent EU antitrust charges, for which the group set aside 1.4 billion euros to cope with the impact. In October 2017, the EU launched surprise investigations into the headquarters of BMW, Daimler and Volkswagen. In April 2018, EU antitrust regulators found collusion among the three car companies to limit the development and promotion of selective catalytic reduction systems and Otto particulate filters, in violation of EU antitrust regulations and could impose huge fines on the three companies.

It is understood that if Kruger's term contract is not extended, there will be two internal leaders running for the post of CEO of BMW Group, but no formal decision has been made yet. One of them is Klaus Fraulich, BMW's R & D director, and the other is Oliver Chips, the production director, both of whom currently serve on the management committee. BMW declined to comment on the report.

Welcome to subscribe to the WeChat public account "Automotive Industry Focus" to get the first-hand insider information on the automotive industry and talk about things in the automotive circle. Welcome to break the news! WeChat ID autoWechat