Volkswagen reorganises purchasing management

Volkswagen has announced that at the turn of the year it will reorganise its purchasing department at the Group level, as well as reorganising purchasing at its VW Passenger Cars and MAN Truck & Bus brands. Dirk Große-Loheide will take over Group Purchasing with effect from 1 January 2023.

Große-Loheide, who is currently an Audi manager, will also be appointed to the Extended Group Management Board, in which the Group bundles the cross-sectional functions of Purchasing and Production, Quality and Sales as well as Design and Development. At the same time, he will be appointed Chief Procurement Officer of the VW Passenger Cars brand. At Audi, Große-Loheide will continue to be responsible for procurement and IT on a provisional basis until his successor has been appointed.

Dirk Große-Loheide succeeds Murat Aksel, who will be appointed to the executive board of MAN Truck & Bus from 2023 onwards. Aksel will take over the purchasing department there from Stefan Gramse, who will assume a Group function at Volkswagen. As a member of the Group Board of Management and Chief Purchasing Officer (CPO), Aksel had held overall responsibility in the Volkswagen Group for the management of materials purchasing and the provision of services since January 2021 and was also responsible for the purchasing department of the Volkswagen Passenger Cars brand.

CEO Oliver Blume explained: “For a global company like Volkswagen maintaining robust supply chains is a critical factor in our success. This restructuring will enable us to strengthen the procurement function on the Group level and in two core areas: Two top managers with crisis experience, Dirk Große-Loheide and Murat Aksel, will assume responsibility for this central job at the volume brand Volkswagen Passenger Cars and MAN Truck & Bus. By taking this step, we will ensure that the strategic restructuring of Group procurement will rapidly move forward.”

Blume also expressly thanked Murat Aksel. He had “set the course for the strategic realignment of procurement in an exceptionally challenging time. He will follow this up at MAN Truck & Bus,” said the VW CEO. Große-Loheide is also to “vigorously continue” the path taken by Aksel. “His task will be to further stabilise the supply chains in close cooperation with the suppliers so that we can deliver the products to our customers as quickly as possible,” says Blume.

Blume has already taken a number of steps in VW management restructuring. A few days ago, Volkswagen announced that it would reorganise the cross-brand functions of quality and design in the course of the change to electromobility and digitalisation.

volkswagen-newsroom.com