chief – All about car

Hiroto Saikawa has resigned as CEO of Nissan with immediate effect after admitting being improperly overpaid. Saikawa had recently indicated he would quit after admitting being overpaid, and his departure was agreed at a board meeting in Japan today. Current COO Yasuhiro Yamauchi will take over as acting CEO, with the company aiming to appoint a new CEO by the end of October. The departure of Saikawa is another blow to Nissan following the revelations of financial misconduct that led to the departure and arrest of former chief Carlos Ghosn and director Greg Kelly. Whereas Ghosn had pushed to fully merge the three companies involved in the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance, Saikawa has been pushing for Nissan to retain full independence. The misconduct came to light in a report from the troubled firm’s audit committee following an internal investigation into misconduct by Ghosn and Kelly. The report, produced by Nissan and an external law firm, listed several specific instances of financial misconduct. While it hasn’t been published in full, Nissan has released an overview of its key points. These include the fact that Saikawa had been overpaid as part of a bonus payment scheme – a charge that he recently admitted. The report says that, in 2013, Saikawa made a request to Kelly to find a way to increase his pay. While Kelly didn’t meet that request, he subsequently recalculated the compensation due from Saikawa’s share appreciation rights and falsified documents to give the appearance that those rights had been exercised a week after the actual date. The report also found that two former Nissan directors and four former or current executives benefitted from share overpayments due to improper handling by Kelly. However, the report suggests that only Ghosn and Kelly will be charged with misconduct, because the others were unaware of the methods employed by Kelly. The overview of the report also includes several examples of how overpayments to Ghosn were concealed and lists several examples of his personal use of company assets. These included $27 million (£21.7m) assigned to Nissan subsidiary Zi-A Capital being spent on properties for Ghosn’s personal use in Beirut and Rio de Janeiro, more than $750,000 (£604,000) being paid to Ghosn’s sister for a fictitious consulating contract and more than $2m (£1.6m) being paid to two universities in Ghosn’s home country of Lebanon with “no legitimate business
Origin: Nissan chief Hiroto Saikawa quits following pay revelations

Detroit, Michigan Ð Jan. 14, 2019 Ð Reid Bigland, Head of Ram Brand, celebrates after 2019 Ram 1500 was named North American Truck of the Year (NATOY) at the North American International Auto Show today. Selected by a jury of automotive journalists, the NATOY award joins a long list of awards won by the Ram brand this year. For more information contact Dave Elshoff at 248-797-2300 or Nick Cappa at 248-202-8039. Reid Bigland, the U.S. sales chief of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA), has filed a “whistleblower” lawsuit against the automaker, claiming he’s been made a scapegoat over a federal probe into inflated sales reporting practices. According to the suit, Bigland said he has cooperated with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and has testified about the sales reports, which he said predated his appointment to the position of sales chief in 2011. Bigland claimed that last March, as punishment for his testimony, FCA slashed his pay by about 90 per cent. The automaker would use his withheld salary to pay any penalties levied by the SEC. Bigland wrote a letter to federal investigators and to FCA last year outlining the reporting practices, which he said “he inherited.” He said he had not manipulated the methodology used to calculate sales. The lawsuit said the automaker’s actions will cost Bigland more than US$1.8 million in his bonus and stock payout. According to the suit, Bigland sold his shares in FCA last year, which the automaker did not like. The suit is asking for unspecified damages. FCA said in a statement that, like all of its corporate officers, Bigland’s bonus is subject to the company’s discretion. According to Automotive News, FCA voluntarily changed the way it reported its U.S. monthly sales, starting in July 2016. It then restated its results for the previous five years using the new method—which turned a previously-reported 75-month-long string of sales increases into about half that. Bigland said he wasn’t part of the new sales reporting process, and was only told that the automaker was considering using different methods. Born in Kamloops, British Columbia, Bigland became CEO of Chrysler Canada in 2006. Along with his position as head of U.S. sales, Bigland also heads up the Ram truck brand, and previously led Dodge, Alfa Romeo, and Maserati. According to the Detroit News, the SEC began its investigations after two dealers in Illinois filed a civil racketeering lawsuit against FCA in 2016, saying the company offered its dealers money to report unsold vehicles as sold. A judge dismissed the racketeering claims and FCA settled the civil
Origin: Fiat Chrysler’s U.S. sales chief files ‘whistleblower’ lawsuit over sales reports