Montezemolo, Felisa and Todt at Geneva 08. Click to view more.
Ferrari today concluded its assembly of shareholders at which Jean Todt stepped down as chief executive officer. Todt was originally hired to head the F1 racing team in 1993, was promoted to general manager of the company in 2003 and CEO in 2006. After relinquishing the role of general manager to Amedeo Felisa in 2006, Todt handed over control of the Scuderia to Stefano Domenicali at the start of this year.
Felisa will now also succeed Todt as CEO. Meanwhile Todt will stay on in certain limited capacities for Ferrari, including a seat on the board, the presidency of both Ferrari Asia Pacific and Ferrari West Europe as well as representation of the Scuderia on the FIA World Council. Todt announced that he had stayed on as chief executive only until company president Luca di Montezemolo completed his term as head of industrial group Confindustria, and that he was now moving on to dedicate more time to himself and his other interests. The shareholders also re-elected Montzemolo as president and Piero Ferrari as vice-president, while renewing the terms of all 13 directors, including Montzemolo, Ferrari, Todt and Felisa as well as Fiat chief Sergio Marchionne, Sergio Pininfarina and seven other board members. For more information, see the press release after the jump.
[Source: Ferrari]
PRESS RELEASE
Ferrari Shareholders’ Meeting: 18th March 2008
FERRARI SHAREHOLDERS’ MEETING: THE RECORD 2007 BALANCE SHEET APPROVED AND MANDATES TO ALL DIRECTORS RENEWED FOR THE FOLLOWING 3 YEARS
LUCA DI MONTEZEMOLO CONFIRMED PRESIDENT BY THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS.
AMEDEO FELISA APPOINTED NEW CEO
JEAN TODT GIVEN SPECIAL APPOINTMENTS BY THE PRESIDENT, AFTER ELECTING TO RELINQUISH HIS POSITION AS CEO
Maranello, March 18th 2008 - The Ferrari shareholders’ Meeting was held today chaired by the President Luca di Montezemolo.
The Assembly approved the balance sheet and the management report which underlined the excellent results achieved by the Prancing Horse company in 2007, a year of great financial and sporting results.
The year 2007, as announced earlier this year, closed with a record balance: 1,668 million euro invoiced, 6,465 cars delivered to the final client and 266 million euro of ordinary management results are some of the main financial indicators together with the significant investment of 300 million euro in research and development for GT cars.
The Assembly also confirmed all the outgoing members of the Board of Directors for the three-year period 2008-2010. The Board is therefore composed as follows: Luca di Montezemolo, Piero Ferrari, Jean Todt, Amedeo Felisa, Alfredo Altavilla, Diego della Valle, Christopher Gent, Ferruccio Luppi, Sergio Marchionne, Paolo Monferino, Lindsay Owen-Jones, Marco Piccinini and Sergio Pininfarina.
The Board of Directors, in their immediately subsequent meeting, renewed the appointments of Luca di Montezemolo as President of Ferrari S.p.A and Piero Ferrari as Vice-President.
The Board, having taken note of Jean Todt’s wish to relinquish his position as CEO, therefore nominated as CEO Amedeo Felisa, to date General Manager of the Maranello company.
Jean Todt, as well as being a member of the Board of Directors of Ferrari S.p.A, maintains his positions as President of the Boards of Directors of Ferrari Asia Pacific and of Ferrari West Europe, and will continue to represent Ferrari at the FIA World Council.
Jean Todt will furthermore be given special appointments directly by the President in the context of GT activities and Sports Management.
Ferrari thanks Jean Todt for the extraordinary human and professional contribution he has made over the last fifteen years of sporting success and great growth for the company of the Prancing Horse.
For his part, Jean Todt emphasized, “My commitment to the President had been to manage the company until the end of his mandate as President of Confindustria and to indicate the new director of the Sports Management. Having accomplished these tasks, a new phase of my life has now begun in which I will have more time to dedicate to myself and my other interests. Naturally I will continue to make a contribution to Ferrari in my institutional positions and in those which the President has chosen to entrust me.”
Todt joined Ferrari in 1993 as Director of GES, in 2004 he became General Manager of Ferrari and then in 2006 took on the position of CEO. On January 1st of this year he handed over the position of Director of GES, which he had been holding temporarily, to Stefano Domenicali. Since Jean Todt arrived in Maranello, the Scuderia Ferrari has won 6 Drivers’ world titles, 7 Constructors’ world titles and 98 Grand Prix in Formula One.
The new CEO, Amedeo Felisa, a 62 year-old, born in Milan, joined Ferrari in 1990 as Director of Product Development. His professional growth has led him take on roles of ever-increasing responsibility culminating in 2006 with his appointment to General Manager and now his appointment to CEO.
Read French? No sweat, because I do. Montreal’s largest French language daily has published a study on its site where 250 vehicles available for sale in Canada were compared on the basis of MRSP, city fuel consumption, highway fuel consumption. Even better, La Presse published the numbers in a Microsoft Excel file where the findings & methodology are bare for all to see, giving full license to challenge the article’s findings. (Imagine Car & Driver or Consumer Reports doing this!) For example, the study’s author, Canadian auto-journalist Alain McKenna, states that American cars top the study by having the lowest operating cost per year. When I sorted the file, I noticed the top three cars were The Chevrolet Aveo, the Pontiac Wave and the Suzuki Swift+. If by “American”, he means “Captive Korean imports badged by General Motors”, I suppose he has a point. He also fails to consider depreciation and maintenance expenses, which tend to be much higher on domestics. Still, it’s quite an interesting spreadsheet to review if you’re a numbers geek like I am. McKenna also points out that some of the cheapest vehicles are not what you’d expect, noting that three pick-ups, The Ford Ranger, Chevrolet Colorado and the Mazda B2300, all beat out the Toyota Prius. Speaking of the Prius, where did it end up? In 67th place, just edging out the V6 Mustang by $0.04/100 km of operation.