General Motors Co. in Detroit is making several changes to its product development team and creating a new role to oversee its global regions as part of the company’s next phase in its growth strategy.
GM officials say these moves are intended to streamline the organization, allow for faster implementation of new vehicle and technology programs, and accelerate the company’s go-to-market strategies.
This realignment is driven by the retirement of Doug Parks, GM executive vice president of global product development, purchasing, and supply chain, after a nearly 40-year career at the company.
Parks started at GM in 1984 and led various engineering teams responsible for the development of dozens of vehicles across all GM brands and regions, including the foundation of our current generation EVs.
“We’ve spent years preparing GM to transition to an all-electric future, and Doug’s leadership has been pivotal. We are grateful for his many contributions to GM’s success,” says Mary Barra, chair and CEO of GM. “The changes we are announcing today will continue to drive technical excellence and deliver groundbreaking vehicles to our customers around the world.”
Ken Morris and Josh Tavel are named to new leadership roles in product development under Mark Reuss, president of GM.
Morris, currently vice president for GM’s global vehicle and propulsion teams, will be promoted to senior vice president for the company’s product programs, product safety and motorsports.
Morris retains his current responsibilities leading global vehicle programs and will add global product safety, launch excellence and motorsports product development.
Tavel, currently global vice president of customer care and aftersales for GM, will be promoted to senior vice president of energy storage and propulsion, research and development, and manufacturing engineering.
This role is meant to integrate GM’s products and processes in key areas critical to accelerating the company’s electrification strategy, including battery development and manufacturing engineering activities.
GM also announced leadership changes to increase collaboration across its global markets.
Rory Harvey, executive vice president and president, GM North America, will move to a newly created role as executive vice president and president, global markets. Harvey will work with the global regional teams to bring the right vehicles, software, and technologies to customers around the world.
And Marissa West, president and managing director, GM Canada, will join the Global Markets leadership team as senior vice president and president, GM North America, reporting to Harvey.
All leadership changes will take effect on Jan. 2, 2024.
In addition to the internal promotions, GM has hired Anantha Kancherla from Meta Platforms Inc. as its new vice president of advanced driver-assistance systems. He is a software engineer with experience working across a wide span of software layers. He worked on building and driving autonomous vehicles initiatives at Level 5, Lyft’s self-driving division. Previously, he worked on Windows at Microsoft focusing on DirectX, graphics, and user interface; Facebook’s mobile Newsfeed and core mobile experiences; and led the collaboration efforts at Dropbox involving launching Dropbox Paper as well as improving core collaboration functionality in Dropbox.
