Editor's note: Subaru’s U.S. sales rose 1.3 percent to 90,163 vehicles through February. An earlier version of this story misstated the total.
TOKYO – Subaru has appointed Atsushi Osaki as its next CEO, tasking the manufacturing chief with steering the small-sized Japanese automaker through a challenging era of electrification, automated driving and industry upheaval as it strives to rekindle U.S. sales.
The next boss, speaking at a Friday press conference, said that flexibility and expansion will be key focal points of his tenure. Subaru will be flexible in quickly responding to market trends, such as electrification. And it will seek to grow in the U.S. and new markets such as Australia.
“We at Subaru want to survive the age of electrification by being nimble,” Osaki said. “We will put various systems in place while focusing on flexibility and expansion.”
In addition, Subaru of America announced Tom Doll will step down as CEO and assume a role as corporate adviser at the company’s U.S. headquarters in Camden, N.J., effective April 1.
Jeff Walters, currently senior vice president of sales, will be promoted to president and COO. Walters has more than 30 years of experience with Subaru of America. Prior to that, he was vice president of field operations. He also held roles as director of field operations, regional sales manager and brand strategy manager.
The U.S., which constitutes Subaru’s biggest market by far, still holds lots of potential, Osaki said. “I believe we can still grow our sales in the U.S.,” he said.
“We also receive a lot of customer inquiries from Japan, Asia, Australia and Canada as well,” he said. “At the moment, we are unable to meet such potential demand due to chip shortages, but we will work to resolve such issues and seek to further increase our sales globally.”
Osaki, 60, most recently served as global production chief but has a long background in quality assurance, serving as the chief quality officer in recent years to root out quality problems.
He takes office in June, joining a reconstituted Subaru board, pending approval at the annual shareholder meeting traditionally held in June.
Current CEO Tomomi Nakamura, 63, will become chairman under the wide-ranging management shuffle announced in Tokyo.