Ceconomy dismisses CEO after less than a year

Ceconomy, the owner of the Media Markt and Saturn chains, is to show its CEO Jörn Werner the door – despite the fact that he had only started his job in March and was fully engaged with the restructuring.

Substantial savings and redundancies

After only 200 days, Ceconomy wants to replace its CEO. The supervisory board will decide on the fate of the CEO on Thursday, but has already issued a communication saying they no longer have any confidence in a future together. In his short time at the helm — Werner was appointed on 31 January and went to work in March — he was able to “inspire neither the management nor employees“, says Manager Magazin.

From the moment he took up the role, the CEO had launched a plan to save costs, which was initially well received on the stock market. His restructuring plan included the loss of 500 jobs, the centralisation of tasks and annual cost savings of up to 130 million euros.

Implementation of the plan began in May, but the steps do not seem to have immediately translated into better business performance. The losses continue to pile up and sales are stagnating. In addition, online sales only rose by 1.7 % in the quarter ending in August.

Patience or power struggle?

Although Werner promised at the time that the company would meet its projections for this financial year, the patience of the supervisory board seems to have already run out. Manager Magazin also suspects that the CEO has allowed himself to get too involved in an internal power struggle and that as a result, his head is now rolling.

This week, a final decision will be made about the future of the CEO. Perhaps his successor is already waiting in the wings, since the supervisory board has announced that his replacement would be appointed before November.