Breaking: Johan de Nysschen Suddenly Leaves Cadillac *Updated*
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Cadillac President Johan de Nysschen has suddenly left the brand, as first reported by Cadillac Society. The executive joined the brand in 2014 and has headed up its operations since then.
Taking de Nysschen’s place will be Steve Carlisle, President and Managing Director of GM Canada. As part of his appointment, Carlisle was also named GM Senior Vice President. Replacing Carlisle at GM Canada will be Travis Hester, currently vice president, Global Product Programs.
Carlisle will report to GM President, Dan Ammann, while Hester will report to GM North America president, Alan Batey. All appointments are effective immediately.
de Nysschen did not provide comment for the General Motors announcement, but Ammann said the following of the now-ex Cadillac chief:
We appreciate Johan’s efforts over the last four years in setting a stronger foundation for Cadillac. Looking forward, the world is changing rapidly, and, beginning with the launch of the new XT4, it is paramount that we capitalize immediately on the opportunities that arise from this rate of change. This move will further accelerate our efforts in that regard.
On his appointment to the top role at Cadillac, Carlisle said, “The potential for Cadillac across the globe is incredible and I’m honored to be chosen to be a part of mapping that future. I look forward to building on our current momentum as we continue on our mission to position Cadillac at the pinnacle of luxury.”
Update: de Nysschen has broken his silence and spoke with Bloomberg for a brief phone interview. He told the publication his exit was cordial and there was no single argument that led to the sudden departure. Without going into detail about the matter, he said, “We agree to disagree and we move on. There wasn’t a fight. Let’s call it philosophical differences.”
This story is breaking and we will update it with additional information as we receive it.
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BEST NEWS I’VE HEARD ALL DAY LONG!
Johan screwed Caddy up something fierce.
Time to get back to the basics. Time to do away with the newest naming structure and go back to what people are familiar with and works. ATS, CTS, XTS for cars and something like ATX, CTX, XTX for suvs. And while you are fixing everything that Johan screwed up, green light a CTS/CT6 coupe with a TRUE V-Series version of it!
I think in many ways Johan de Nysschen was on the right track with things like the move to New York, an exclusive engine, and elevating the standards for their dealers but in other ways he was leading the brand astray and was stubborn and intransigent. The whole Cadillac as BMW persona thing was wrong, the brutal V-Series cars were wrong, the naming scheme was wrong. I’m not sure where the dividing line was and how much of that was his fault but my prescription for Cadillac has always called for more focus on Cadillac’s roots and less copying of BMW. To that end, exclusive RWD platforms are needed, exclusive Cadillac engines are a must, a dedicated Bowling Green-like home plant for Cadillac is needed. Beyond that though, Cadillac has never been a carmaker known for raw performance and trying to turn them into one was a mistake. Cadillac should never be the purveyor of Corvette sedans; somebody seemed to be intent on making them into that and if that someone is gone, perhaps this is a good day.
Once again, back to the drawing board. Now watch all Cadillacs will get names to follow Lincoln.
It’s time for GM to consider shuttering the brand. Enough money has been wasted here and there’s no hope of competing on an equal basis with the German brands.
Maybe JDN came to that same realization?
That’s my real concern. Cadillac is on verge of being Oldsmobiled.
The difference is Cadillac is making money Olds was losing money and had no ATP to even mention.
I bet any money he is heading back to VW Group in some format… They just had a huge management shakeup and I could easily see him moving into a higher executive level there.
A comment from Ayylelmao over at Jalopnik:
“Stop trying to make the market’s American German car and just make a ground-up American luxury car with swagger and balls. You’re never going to beat the Beatles by doing Beatles covers. You gotta be the Stones.”
So simple, so true. My thoughts exactly. Nobody is going to buy an imitation BMW when they can have the real deal for the same money. GM needed to be building genuine Cadillacs; something different, something original.
That’s a great comment. Why is it so obvious to us, yet GM keeps thinking they have to make Cadillac a German wannabe instead of being the proud, brash, American luxury brand that it once was? The German-wannabe problem started before Johan arrived; he simply made it worse.
The comparison of a band doing Beatles covers instead of their own music is perfect. And you are right, be original. Leave the copying to brands like Hyundai/Genesis. Cadillac made its name as a leader, not a follower. Have some Cadillac core values and stick to them!
What a sad day…
I really hope his projects won’t be canceled or smth.
Ya, I thought he was doing well for Cadillac. I’m not an automobile executive so I am most likely wrong. Hopefully, Carlisle will be effective in making Cadillac a strong competitor to premier luxury companies like BMW and Mercedes.
Lincoln has claimed to out shined Cadillac several times and yet they fail in the end. Remember the Continental?
The Navigator will just be out for a short while when the new Escalade will appear and upstage it again. That is if the GM board does not cancel it and try to pass a rebadged Denali for a Cadillac.
I do not expect a lot of changed to the next few models as it is too late to change much. We at least have the TT V8 now too.
Anymore major changes would just delay things even more.
That is a shocker. I wonder what really happened. There is more here than they are letting on.
Another one bites the dust…
But Queen Mary keeps her $28M salary.
You saying as a women, she should even get less? Ford are paying their top guy and previous one more than that.
I look at the monthly North American sedan sales figures and shake my head. Pro sports team analogy here?
Wtf, Drewww!!!!!…..
I’m blown away, GM truly have no direction for cars at all….
It’s about time. No midsized SUV, poor quality as per Consumer’s Reports. All vehicles in the Cadillac line up are rated below average in quality. Dealers upset with pricing model. New blood at the top is was needed.
GM strikes again, what a mess. How do they expect someone to fix the brand if they don’t give him or her enough time to see their plan comes to fruition? JDN’s product assault was just getting started & the GM boards decides to play musical chairs again. At this rate, Cadillac will never recover, Might as well kill it now & put it out of its misery.
I don’t know much about Steve Carlisle beyond what’s in his GM page, but I wish him luck & I sincerely hope he’s not just another spineless GM yes man.
Also, don’t unpack, dude, you’re at least the 4th Cadillac CEO in less than 10 years.
F*&$$& GM.
Carlisle is a GM lifer who will report directly to Dan Ammann, a finance guy. What could possibly go wrong?
I’d give him about 3 years before they sack him too … Just enough time for whatever Cadillac currently have in the pipeline to see the light … If they don’t cancel them that is.
Actually he’s an engineer, but hey, WTF is reading comprehension when you’re throwing a good temper tantrum right?
Mark Reuss is an engineer as well & we all know how that turned out …
Hmmmn, reading comprehension, eh? Let’s take a look under the hood…
WHAT I SAID: Carlisle is a GM lifer who will report directly to Dan Ammann, a finance guy.
WHAT YOU SAID: Actually he’s an engineer, but hey, WTF is reading comprehension when you’re throwing a good temper tantrum right?
REALITY…
Steve Carlisle – Education
Massachusetts Institute of Technology – Sloan School of Management
Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.), Business Administration and Management, General
1998 – 1999
University of Waterloo
BASC, Systems Design Engineering
1981 – 1986
***He began his career with GM as a co-op student in industrial engineering at the Oshawa Truck Assembly Center in 1982***
https://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/private/person.asp?personId=27225594&privcapId=61206100
Now Dan Ammann…
Dan Ammann – Education
Bachelor’s Degree
The University of Waikato
***Mr. Ammann served as the Chief Financial Officer at General Motors Company from April 01, 2011 to January 15, 2014 and also served as its Executive Vice President since 2013 until January 15, 2014. Mr. Ammann served as the Principal Financial Officer at General Motors Holdings LLC. He served as Vice President of Finance and Treasurer at General Motors Company from May 1, 2010 to April 1, 2011 and also served as its Senior Vice President from April 2011 to January 2014. He served as a Managing Director and Head of Industrial Investment Banking for Morgan Stanley, since 2004.***
https://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/people/person.asp?personId=105658479&privcapId=61206100
^ So it sounds like–if I’m *comprehending* this right–Steve Carlisle has an engineering degree. And he’s been with the company since 1982. Is that not the very definition of a GM lifer? And Dan Ammann, who is GM’s former CFO, is in fact a finance guy then, right? So who exactly has the reading comprehension issue again?
Carlisle has a background as an engineer (in production), so that’s in his favor right away. He’s also from Woodstock in Ontario, which is about 130 miles from Detroit. So it’s likely that he understands what Cadillac actually means to North Americans, unlike Johan from South Africa. And he’s 55 years old, which is experienced enough to know what he’s doing, yet still energetic enough to run a major brand. Looks like a very good choice, from what we can see.
My guess is that Cadillac eventually returns to Detroit, and that Melody Lee will be in tears when they leave New York City. If she still has a job at that point, which I doubt very much. Wouldn’t it be great to be rid of Uwe, Johan, and Melody within the same 12 month period? That’s what I’d call winning the trifecta! Congrats to the GM board and/or Barra for finally waking up to Cadillac mismanagement.
BAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Watch Steve turn Cadillac into another BMW knock off, just like Bob Ferguson & the dude before him ….. If he lasts that long
During the same period, Volvo and Jaguar actually turned around. Arguably from deeper depths. Product overhaul, sales momentum, new demand from younger buyers, …. the job that was SUPPOSED to be done at Cadillac. Arrogance and bad casting. in 5 years, GM will sell Cadillac to their China JV for $20B and move on. That’s what they should do, how many DECADES (literally decades) of shrinking sales and reputation does the board need to admit, they can’t compete at the high end anymore? They may have been the kind once, but nobody at GM, clearly, knows how to create and sell top tier brands. Make the touch call, focus on what you can do, and move on. So much wasted time and resources on a fool’s errand. You’re right, one or two more of those arrogant, poor decision making execs to go, then we’ll see.
Great news! Maybe the real Cadillac brand can be saved after all. Under JdN, Cadillac meant nothing, no connection with what made them great. The XT4 was the final nail, it wasn’t luxury, wasn’t “Cadillac” in anything but name.
JdN was always about “the future”. But “the future” kept getting pushed back further and further. Big promises of “shocking the world”, but not until after 2022? Meantime US sales were collapsing. As I’ve said, it’s easy to sell “the future” to the naive. Looks like Barra and the board finally wised up.
JdN never should have been hired to run Cadillac in the first place. A guy who grew up with no Cadillacs anywhere near his country, and who thought only BMW and other German cars were the best, was not right for running an American icon. JdN had a very limited playbook, the same one he tried to run at Infiniti. Step 1, move the HQ (Tokyo to Hong Kong, Detroit to NYC). Step 2, rename all the cars with similar letter/number combos (Q and QT for Infiniti, CT and XT for Cadillac). Step 3, copy BMW (always one car generation behind), even if your home country isn’t particularly suited for BMW imitations.
JdN was not even consistent in his strategy. He said he wanted to make Cadillac “premium” by raising prices, and derided past Cadillac sales as “wrong driveways”. But then he gave Cadillac cheap decontented vehicles like the base ATS and CTS, both having vinyl seats and halogen headlamps. He said Cadillac needed a small CUV to get young people to be Cadillac customers for life, then delivered the mediocre, Chevy-like XT4. How can a brand be premium with a bunch of cheap base versions, lots of black plastic and vinyl? And then his “customers for life” theory showed its flaws, when he offered $10k rebates to existing Escalade owners to stay with the brand. If they were customers for life, why would anyone look at another brand.
JdN didn’t understand what Cadillac meant to Americans, and he wasn’t an engineer, a designer, or a production line expert. In the end, JdN was simply a salesman, and was very good at selling – himself. He leaves with a boatload of cash, while he’s confused customers as to what the Cadillac brand actually means. Hopefully the new guy actually understands what Cadillac means and has a coesive plan.
Drew,
Much of what you say is right but if GM, and their newly installed Caddy chief, thinks they can rehash more FWD Chevys and turn Cadillac into a Tier 1 luxury brand, then we would’ve been better off with Johan.
As I said earlier, he had a lot right particularly about separating Cadillac so folks specifically attuned to the luxury market were in charge at Cadillac. He had the RWD focus right although I know you disagree there. He also sought in the downtime before new models launch to work on improving dealers which was a wise move. The new V-8 is exactly what Cadillac needed. However, it was hard to square the grandiose promises he’d made with the shockingly poor execution of his first product, the XT4. I don’t know if that’s the best he could get out of GM or if he actually thought it was good and believed his own hype leading up to its debut. He lead us all to believe it would be a big departure and begin an onslaught of amazing new products. There’s been near universal agreement that it didn’t live up to expectations and comes across as a upgraded Chevy Trax rather than a game-changing Cadillac.
A couple of thoughts really trouble me: Could it be that the GM Board has seen Cadillac’s upcoming line of JdN influenced products and is not impressed? Or, perhaps, the “disagreement” meant the GM Board was unwilling to fund world class products and JdN simply didn’t want to be a part of an organization unwilling to do what it takes to win. Either proposition is bad.
I do agree with you that Cadillac has a special place in American history and in the psyche of Americans over about 45 and JdN did not understand that at all. His notion of luxury was European-based and his ideas for the brand were all seemingly geared towards remaking Cadillac into his more Germanic vision of luxury. That’s not the right path in my estimation.
Not all that surprising in view of exit from Europe, ultimatum in Korea… Sadly it may not be what WE want, but the board runs the company for the owners, the stockholders. Let’s not forget that Cadillac was and is still a division of GM and GM decides where the division goes, not Cadillac management. Stockholders, specifically funds, are mostly looking for gratification now–not five years down the road. They want increased value that is MOSTLY driven by financial results! Sorry, but this is the American way!
Keep in mind it was never likely Cadillac would be totally autonomous. They would owe GM the $12 billion investment and the only likely place the future Cadillacs could be built was in plants shared with other GM products.
I hope Steve Carlisle makes a public statement very soon regarding Cadillac brand strategy
Best news from GM and Cadillac in ages.
With JDN’s update comment of “Let’s call it philosophical differences” you have to wonder if the Buick Enspire received so much unexpected positive reception that GM Corp told JDN, “The Enspire received a better response than the XT4, let’s fast track electrify it”…
Those of you who think it will now all be FWD cars or boring crossovers haven’t been a P100X yet…The Buick Enspire has the same 0-60 and “range” as a current SS Camaro…
Johan de Nysschen was out of sync as he felt Cadillac should be like a Fabergé egg, very precious and rare while what de Nysschen should have tried doing was to try getting people to think of Cadillac cars like the Apple iPhone.. while expensive, it should be something people would line up for especially when Cadillac is building world class vehicles like the CT6 and XT5.
CT6 looks good but there are too many quality issues. Waving a wand declaring issues “characteristic” does not make owners happy or repeat buyers.
Nothing against this guy, but I for one am glad he’s gone. I think he was taking Cadillac in the wrong direction.