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Automotive Industry

Triple Lutz - Cunningham Automobile Company - Brief Article

Automotive Industries, Oct, 2000 by Lindsay Brooke

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* Modern classics: "There's huge opportunity in the entire PT Cruiser/New Beetle phenomenon, of bringing back a classic in modernized form," he says. "And there's nothing that says it only works in compact size." Besides the Cunningham project. Lutz imagines a luxury car inspired by the svelte 1937 Lincoln Zephyr 4-door sedan -- or an even larger luxo-tourer like the Chrysler Atlantic concept car. "Doing cars that ALL look like Acura TLs, Oldsmobile Intrigues. Mazda 626s, ad nauseam -- they ALL look the same! It's the road to nowhere."

* Pickup trucks: "A limitless field," Lutz opines. "The Power Wagon concept that Chrysler had a few years ago was a glorious idea. That entire front end could be carried over onto an SUV. Chevy's SSR will also be a hit. I think. You just have to think outside of categories."

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Running A Tier 1

Aggressive restructuring and tech partnerships are Lutz's remedy for Exide's rebirth.

"I had no real idea how bad the company's troubles were when I agreed to join," recalls Lutz about joining North America's largest automotive lead-acid battery supplier as CEO over two years ago.

"They had basically no functioning financial systems and no control," he says. "Nobody really knew what they were doing and the manufacturing philosophy was antiquated. They didn't even know what a 'pull system' was!"

Turning Exide around has taken 100 percent of his time; by comparison, he says he spends perhaps 15 minutes a day with the Cunningham project. An aggressive restructuring plan puts cost-cutting, management reorganization, technology partnerships and perhaps some acquisitions at the top of Lutz's priority list. The company is incurring a $17 million charge against its recently-ended fiscal 2000 second quarter earnings. It will merge its U.S. and Canadian aftermarket sales groups and close a number of plants and 11 North American distribution centers. Lutz is even shifting Exide's motorsports focus to an associate, rather than full sponsorship of his good friend Jack Roush's NASCAR team, a move expected to save $15 million annually.

Lutz is now seeing some positive results, but admits that Exide's tarnished image still needs work.

"It's not fixed yet," he says. "We're still at the point where Chrysler was in the late 1980s, before we started bringing out all the new vehicles. But behind the scenes, everything's changed. My first priority was putting the right team together. We've got a really blue-ribbon board of directors that includes (ASC boss) Heinz Prechter, Francois Castaing and Lynn Cheney, wife of Dick Cheney. It's fabulous. And almost the entire company management has been changed."

He's now attacking Exide's strategic. aims: getting back into the industrial battery business and rebuilding the automotive business. That's why the company decided to buy GNB Technologies, the largest industrial batterymaker in the U.S. and hugely profitable. When that acquisition is complete in a month or two, Lutz will run Exide's U.S. automotive business out of GNB's Atlanta facility and its industrial business from the former GNB Chicago headquarters. He's established Exide's corporate office in Princeton, N.J., "where we can attract good people." He expects to close almost half the combined companies' plants.

Automotive Industry

Triple Lutz - Cunningham Automobile Company - Brief Article

Automotive Industries, Oct, 2000 by Lindsay Brooke

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