Following pressure on it to follow other major western companies in withdrawing business from Russia following its invasion of Ukraine, French carmaker Renault has announced the company is to cede its 68% stake in the biggest Russian vehicle manufacturer, AvtoVAZ, but with an option to buy it back within six years.
Of the 4,600 jobs to go in France, many would be through a voluntary departure plan and a retirement scheme, said Franck Daout of the CFDT trade union.
French carmaker Renault on Friday announced it would seek a cut in operating costs of 2 billion euros over the next three years, hinting at a major cull in jobs, after it reported net losses of 141 million euros in 2019, the first in a decade, due to lower sales and a falling contribution from its Japanese partner Nissan.
Former Renault chief executive and Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn's secret escape from Japan on December 29th, when he was allegedly smuggled out of the country in a musical instrument box by hired former special services veterans, was as dramatic as his arrest there one year earlier on charges of serious financial misconduct. But the manner of his flight bore all the hallmarks of the use over two decades by the one-time titan of the world’s carmaking industry of private security personnel, both to spy on his staff but also shareholders and board members. Mediapart's Matthieu Suc, author of a recent book detailing Ghosn’s seeming obsession with surveillance, reports.
The former Renault chairman and CEO, Carlos Ghosn, has travelled to Lebanon having fled from Japan where he was on bail facing charges of alleged financial wrongdoing. Ghosn, who was also chairman of Renault's Japanese partner Nissan, and who has always claimed his innocence, immediately justified the extraordinary move by saying he no longer wanted to be “held hostage by a rigged Japanese justice system where guilt is presumed”. From the start of the affair Ghosn has claimed he is the victim of a plot, while largely avoiding details of the allegations against him. Mediapart's Matthieu Suc, author of a recent book on Renault, reports.
French carmaker Renault, which last week sacked its CEO Thierry Bolloré, who himself replaced Carlos Ghosn after the latter's arrest last year in Japan where he is still detained, saw its shares tumble on Friday after issuing a profit warning and announcing 2019 sales were likely to drop by up to 4%.
Carole Ghosn, wife of Carlos Ghosn who was arrested in Japan last November on accusations of financial misconduct, has appealed to US President Donald Trump to help end his continued detention in Tokyo by lobbying the Japanese prime minister at the forthcoming G20 summit.
French carmaker Renault, partly state-owned, could reduce its stake in its Japanese counterpart Nissan in an effort to save the strained commercial alliance between the two marques, said France's economy and finance minister Bruno Le Maire, adding that French plans for a merger between the two, resisted by Nissan, could be abandoned.
