TITLE: Chief Purchasing and Supply Chain Officer
COMPANY: Stellantis
BASED: Paris, France
 

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS

Michelle Wen is Stellantis’ first head of purchasing and supply chain, a post she held at PSA Group before the merger with Fiat Chrysler to create the new group in January 2021. She started her career in 1992 with Thomson Multimedia and then joined Phillips Group’s automotive division. Wen moved to the Renault-Nissan alliance in 2000 as a supplier account manager. She then worked as an executive for sourcing at Alstom and Vallourec from 2008 to 2016. Wen joined Opel in September 2017, soon after the brand’s acquisition by PSA Group, as vice president purchasing and supply chain, and in June 2018 was named executive vice president global purchasing and supplier quality at PSA. She holds a business degree from American University in Taipei and studied at the London School of Economics and ESCP-EAP in Paris.

REASON FOR WINNING

Carlos Tavares gave Michelle Wen, then head of purchasing at PSA Group, a monumental challenge at Stellantis when the new company was created in January out of the merger of PSA Group and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, making it the sixth-largest automaker in terms of global volume. As the executive in charge of coordinating purchasing and supply chains for more than a dozen brands, she will be responsible for delivering a significant part -- about 35 percent -- of the 5-billion-euro-plus annual synergies that Stellantis plans to deliver starting in 2026.  

To deliver those efficiencies, Wen is working to merge two complex, global purchasing organizations and two supply bases with significant overlap in Europe, Latin America and China. Among the headwinds she is facing are expected jumps in the price of raw materials and the continuing semiconductor shortage that has plagued automakers around the world. Ultimately, she is responsible for making sure components are delivered at the right place and the right time to a manufacturing footprint that now includes 51 assembly plants and 37 powertrain factories.