Ghosn Gives Up Chairmanship of AvtoVAZ

Renault-Nissan Alliance CEO Carlos Ghosn will relinquish his position as chairman of Russia’s largest carmaker, OAO AvtoVAZ , on June 23.

The alliance gained control of AvtoVAZ in 2013 when it acquired a majority stake in Alliance Rostec Auto BV, the holding company that oversees the carmaker.

Ghosn will continue as chairman of Alliance Rostec, in which Rostec State Corp. owns a minority stake. Ghosn and Rostec State CEO Sergey Chemezov are quitting the AvtoVAZ board, but both will continue to play active roles in the carmaker’s strategy.

Replacing Ghosn as AvtoVAZ chairman will be Chemezov lieutenant Serguey Skvortsov. Renault has named Denis Le Vot, a member of the French company’s management committee, as AvtoVAZ’s vice chairman.

The management shuffle will bolster Russian influence over Renault-Nissan’s drastic efforts at AvtoVAZ to cut costs, eliminate corruption and streamline an inefficient supply chain. Those efforts were led by CEO Bo Andersson, who Ghosn installed three years ago. Andersson was ousted earlier this month amid friction over the economic impact of the overhaul on Togliatti, where AvtoVAZ is based.

Andersson’s successor as CEO is Nicolas Maure, who previously headed Renault’s Dacia unit in Romania.