VW Group, Polestar Rising Stars get key promotions

Several Automotive News Europe Rising Stars have been given big promotions recently.

Xavier Ros was appointed Audi's board member for human resources last week.

He moves to the German premium brand fromVolkswagen Group sister brand Seat, where he has been the Spanish automaker's board member for HR since 2015.

Ros was personnel director at Seat when he was named one of ANE's first class of Rising Stars in 2011.

One reason he was chosen for the award was because he helped negotiate a deal with Seat's unions to build the Audi Q3 at the company's plant in Martorell.

Ros' Audi connections run deep.

His first job after earning a degree in industrial engineering was with the automaker in 1994 as part of its production and logistics division. The Barcelona-born executive moved from Audi to Seat's technical development division in 1999 to work on the third-generation Ibiza small car.

He transition to the Seat's HR team in 2007 and has had great success ever since.

Ros succeeded Sabine Maassen as Audi's HR chief on May 20.

Successful launch in Germany

Alexander Lutz, who was named a 2021 ANE Rising Star, has been tapped to lead Polestar's entry into the Italian market.

Lutz was picked for the job for the same reason he was chosen a Rising Star: because of the successful launch he led of Volvo Cars subsidiary's operations in his native Germany.

Polestar increased sales in Europe's largest market by more than 150 percent to 2,631 units last year, according to the country's KBA motor authority.

In a little more than a year, Polestar also went from zero brand awareness in Germany and no volume to having seven premium dealer groups as investors, Lutz told ANE during an interview last year.

Polestar commercial operations boss for Europe Scott Dicken said Lutz's past professional experience and expertise "make him the ideal choice" to establish the brand's operations in Italy.

Like Ros, Lutz is returning to a place he knows well. The executive, who speaks Italian, worked at Maserati for three years, rising to the Stellantis brand's head of global marketing operations before moving to Polestar in 2020.

Focus on sustainability

Rising Star Class of 2014 member Mike Bell is also starting a new position. He is now chief strategy and digital officer at Ricardo. His new job has put him into position "to create a safe and sustainable world," he said on Linkedin this month.

Bell will also be responsible for the engineering consultancy's corporate strategy.

Bell was Jaguar Land Rover's global connected car director when he joined the Rising Stars Club.

At the time, the idea of connected cars was just starting to gain wider traction.

Bell, who has a doctorate in computer science and a resume with several non-automotive jobs, was not intimidated by the shift. He also gave this advice eight years ago to anyone thinking about joining the auto industry: "Observe and learn from other industries and be prepared to work cross-functionally."

Today, that's the norm, but eight years ago it wasn't.

The next wave of ANE Rising Stars will be announced on June 16.

The Class of 2022 winners will be officially added to the Rising Stars family on July 13.