Volvo Cars Chief Operating Officer and Deputy CEO Javier Varela has left the company to join U.S. EV maker Rivian after eight years on its top-level Executive Management Team (EMT).
Varela, 59, was responsible for R&D, manufacturing, procurement, supply chain and quality. He played a key role in the 2018 opening of Volvo's U.S. factory; the selection of Kosice, Slovakia, for a new €1.2 billion European manufacturing plant; and the switch to megacasting for large aluminum body parts.
Varela was hand-picked by Volvo CEO Jim Rowan in June 2022 as one of two deputy CEOs to help lead the company's transition into being an electric-only brand by 2030. Bjorn Annwall will remain deputy CEO and chief commercial officer. Volvo will no longer have two deputy CEOs.
Varela will join Rivian in August as its new chief operations officer, Rivian said in a statement.
Bigger board
Varela's departure has led to a shake-up of Volvo's top board, boosting its size to nine members from seven.
The three members of Volvo's lower-tier Group Management Team (GMT) getting promotions to the EMT are: Chief Product and Strategy Officer Erik Severinson; Chief Engineering and Technology Officer Anders Bell; and Chief Supply Chain Officer Francesca Gamboni.
Severinson, 44, who celebrates 20 years with Volvo this year, joined the GMT in 2023 and has been Volvo's head of strategy and program management for engineering and operations since 2022. He previously served as head of industrial strategy and group finance controller. In his new role he will be responsible for company and product strategy, car program management, quality and sustainability.
Bell, 49, who is in his second stint with Volvo, has served as head of engineering since 2022, leading car engineering, R&D across hardware and software, and safety. He started at the company in 1998 as a design engineer and rose to senior director of engineering in 2014. Bell in 2016 left Volvo for Tesla, where he spend six years in top engineering jobs. He returned to Volvo from Tesla in December 2022 as head of global R&D and engineering.
Gamboni, 58, joined Volvo last October. She has more than a decade of combined automotive supply chain management experience with Stellantis and Renault. Gamboni has also worked at Robert Bosch, L'Oreal and mining giant Alcan, which is now Rio Tinto.
All three will report to Rowan, who said in a statement: "This change will help us to flatten our structure in operations and elevate these important areas as we deliver on our technological and commercial transformation.”
In addition, Volvo said Thursday that its head of manufacturing, Geert Bruyneel, will also report to Rowan, but he will remain a member of the GMT.
After the summer, the manufacturing division will report to Gamboni and Bruyneel will take on a new role as senior advisor - operations and industrial projects.
Bruyneel, who will continue to report to Rowan in the new role, will lead strategic projects, support production ramp ups at Volvo's factories in Kosice and Ghent, Belgium, and oversee efficiency projects throughout the company.
