Aston Martin On The Hunt For A New CEO

Despite only having taken the job less than two years ago, it seems that current Aston Martin CEO Amedeo Felisa may soon be out of a job if new reports about company chairman Lawrence Stroll are true. Bloomberg writes that Stroll is looking for the luxury automaker's fourth chief executive in as many years, with interviews of candidates already underway. The publication goes on to say that anonymous insiders claim Stroll has contacted «current and former heads of other luxury auto manufacturers to gauge interest in the role.»

Felisa has been in charge of the automaker since May 2022, and in that time, there has been considerable progress in numerous avenues, but his was never intended to be a long tenure.

Mr. Felisa was enjoying retirement from running Ferrari when Stroll came knocking. Now, the Italian is nearly 78, and since much progress has been made with Aston Martin since he joined the company, finding a replacement shouldn't be too difficult. Everyone likes a challenge, but before Stroll took over in 2020, things were looking dire, and that was even with a former AMG man (Tobias Moers) taking the helm after Andy Palmer.

All of those CEOs achieved some success, but only Felisa has been around to see the fruits of Stroll and Saudi Arabia's investments. These include the launch of the Aston Martin DB12 and its vastly improved new infotainment system that will be shared across the portfolio, a new Le Mans racing program, and imminently, the reveal of a new Vantage.

Now Aston Martin needs a CEO to guide it through the next phase of its revitalization, including the rollout of the Valhalla, and that will require a captain who must remain at the helm for more than two years.

Gaydon needs somebody with a long-term view because, besides taking the Valkyrie to Le Mans and launching replacements for the current crop of Astons, more new cars are on the way over the course of the decade, including electric machines built with government help. A mercenary of a CEO cannot facilitate goals like these.

Around a year after Felisa took the job, Stroll said that the company would launch eight new cars in two years to replace the entire current range. Since then, we've had