Midway through her seventh year running General Motors it’s time to assess the legacy of CEO and Chairperson Mary Barra, the first woman to run an automobile company. Of the 14 CEOs that have led GM, Barra’s term in office has been exceeded by only four of her predecessors: Alfred Sloan Jr. (May 10, 1923 – June 3, 1946), Roger
After failing in 2017 and 2018 to put a single woman on-stage to deliver a high profile keynote, the Consumer Technology Association featured four female keynoters in 2019. Until recently, two women were on the docket for the 2020 show in January, but news arrived last week that General Motors’ CEO Mary Barra had cancelled… Read More
What is it about General Motors? The once largest maker of cars in the world (now sixth or seventh) has been in an all-fronts retreat for years – while Wall Street analysts and top GM brass whistle past the graveyard touting gains in the company’s stock price and profitability.
GM has exited key markets including Europe, India and
The automotive industry is a funny business. It is simultaneously ruled by ego driven “visionaries” and penny-pinching bean counters. (Don’t believe me? Just ask Bob Lutz.) This id-superego tension plays out in business section headlines every day most recently including the death of FCA’s Sergio… Read More
General Motors CEO Mary Barra is known for a number of quotes one of which is: “My father was a die maker for 39 years, so I had a basic understanding of the automobile industry and what the manufacturing world was like, just from the opportunity to spend time with him, just talking, because he was a car buff.” One has to wonder what Mary’s… Read More
General Motors has two media magnets in CEO Mary Barra and Cruise Automation founder Kyle Vogt. Barra is praised for boosting GM profitability while streamlining operations and making strategic investments. Vogt, the beneficiary of one of those investments – in his autonomous vehicle technology company – embodies GM’s aspirations… Read More
There hasn’t been this much excitement in Munich since the 1920’s. Nvidia’s great pivot was on display at the GPU Technology Conference Munich 2017. Digital dashboards are out and robotaxis are in as Nvidia narrows its focus on the tip of the automotive industry disruption spear.
To be clear, Nvidia is triangulating on the automotive… Read More
The U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) is holding the first meeting today of a new advisory committee focused, in its own words: “on automation across a number of modes.” The committee, made up of an array of experts from a variety of fields, is “to immediately begin work on some of the most pressing and… Read More
Padmasree Warrior, CEO and chief development officer of NextEV USA, kicked off day two of the LA Auto Show’s Automobility LA with a powerful perspective on the current state of the automotive industry. She rattled off the usual litany of congestion, highway fatalities, emissions and changing usage and ownership models… Read More
