Nissan shuffles executives into new collective ‘troika’

Nissan Motor unveiled the responsibilities of its new top managers, appointing a new chief financial officer and making other executive moves as the Japanese car maker seeks to turn a new page almost a year since the arrest of former Chairman Carlos Ghosn.

Stephen Ma, corporate controller and former chief financial officer of Nissan’s China joint venture, will take over as chief financial officer from Hiroshi Karube, the Yokohama-based company said in a statement yesterday. Newly appointed chief executive Makoto Uchida will formally join the board, taking over from Dec 1.

Nissan overhauled top management a month ago, adopting a collective-style leadership aimed at moving past the outsized influence that Ghosn was seen to have had over Nissan and its alliance with top shareholder Renault SA. Ashwani Gupta was appointed chief operating officer, and Jun Seki as deputy chief operating officer. The three face monumental challenges as they seek to restore profitability that has come to a decade low while competing in an era of transition to electrification and autonomous vehicles.

“Nissan needs to review its relationship with Renault, rebuild its US business, restructure, speed up new car development and restore overall profitability,” said Koji Endo, an analyst at SBI Securities. “That is the responsibility of this troika.”

Mr Ma, a graduate of the University of California, Irvine, and the University of Southern California, has been at Nissan since 1999, according to his LinkedIn profile. He served as chief financial officer of DongFeng Motor., the Chinese business of Nissan that Mr Uchida ran before his promotion to chief executive.

Mr Gupta’s responsibilities will include production and processes, while Seki will oversee performance recovery, future mobility and other areas, Nissan said. Christian Vandenhende, an executive who joined Nissan from Renault, will continue as chief quality officer in charge of customer satisfaction.

Mr Uchida and Mr Gupta will also formally join the board, while acting chief executive Yasuhiro Yamauchi will remain as a director. Mr Karube, former chief product officer of Philippe Klein and Hitoshi Kawaguchi, head of government affairs, will leave the board, Nissan said. All of the appointments are also effective from December.