The corporate musical chairs at Stellantis never truly stop. Effective July 1st, the automotive colossus is giving its “Enlarged Europe” division a major facelift. When market numbers look awkward, the favorite executive strategy is to shuffle the management deck. Under the watchful eye of Emanuele Cappellano, the COO for Enlarged Europe, Antonio Filosa’s empire is rolling out a series of executive promotions that sound suspiciously like asking a few brave souls to do twice the work for the same corporate glory.
The headline act of this management circus belongs to Santo Ficili. Already tasked with steering the eternally “almost-reborn” Alfa Romeo, Ficili is now also the CEO of Maserati. Stellantis has decided that running one legendary, struggling premium Italian brand in a cutthroat global market isn’t exhausting enough, so they handed him a second one.
Corporate PR will spin this as a strategic move for “continuity” and “brand identity”. In reality, treating Alfa Romeo and Maserati like a buy-one-get-one-free special looks more like an extreme survival tactic. Ficili now holds the keys to two of the most emotionally charged, yet financially volatile, badges in automotive history. Good luck to his calendar.
Meanwhile, Luca Napolitano is being deployed to the literal frontlines of the commercial crisis as the new Head of Stellantis &You Sales and Services. Napolitano is an insider who knows the ropes, which is fortunate because his new mission involves fixing the increasingly fractured relationship between the manufacturer and the actual human beings buying the cars. With retail networks facing the brutal reality of EV stagnation, changing consumer habits, and a digital shift that nobody seems to fully enjoy, Napolitano’s seat is bound to get hot very quickly.
Then comes the grand finale: the exit of Jean-Philippe Imparato. After a staggering 36-year marathon within the company, the veteran executive is packing his bags and leaving the group. Cappellano sent him off with the classic corporate eulogy, praising his “unmatched contribution” and calling him a perfect blend of passion and business.
It is a polite, poetic way to close a nearly four-decade chapter, leaving outsiders to wonder whether Imparato chose the perfect moment to escape the impending storms of the European automotive transition or if the system simply ran out of room for old-school passion. Either way, the new guard is officially operational, and the Stellantis math is about to be put to the ultimate test.
