by Mark Rechtin of www.autonews.com
LOS ANGELES -- Mike Accavitti, the former Chrysler executive who
became American Honda's chief marketing officer in 2011, is adding
responsibility for several key departments, including product planning.
Accavitti,
54, has been promoted to senior vice president of automobile
operations. While continuing to supervise national marketing operations,
he will add product planning, logistics, sales and production planning,
distribution, quality assurance, company vehicle administration and
market research.
His ascension and new duties should give
American Honda more say in the parent company's product planning
process. Although Honda's U.S. engineering team is heavily involved in
many products sold in North America, decisions on global platforms often
are deferred to Japan.
The volume-leading Accord, Civic, Odyssey
and CR-V have been redesigned in the last two years, so r&d work on
the next generation is just beginning.
The pairing of Accavitti
with John Mendel, executive vice president of sales, mirrors the
successful structure Honda used last decade, when sales boss Dick
Colliver and product chief Tom Elliott operated as a two-man team.
The change takes effect April 1.
Mendel, 58, remains in charge of American Honda sales, sales
communications and dealer operations. In an interesting split, Accavitti
handles national marketing and advertising, while Mendel oversees
regional marketing and advertising.
Accavitti's new duties give
more clout to an area of American Honda previously overseen by Art St.
Cyr, vice president of corporate planning and logistics. St. Cyr retains
those duties, but now reports to Accavitti.
As before, both
Accavitti and Mendel will report to American Honda President Tetsuo
Iwamura, who recently was promoted to executive officer of Honda Motor
Co.
Accavitti joined Honda after a short stint at Cisco Systems,
which followed a 25-year career at Chrysler. He was president of the
Dodge brand and lead marketing executive at Chrysler Group before his
2009 departure.
Currently, Accavitti's main job is overseeing the
$900 million national advertising agency review for the Honda and Acura
brands. A decision regarding the final four candidates, including
incumbent agency RPA, is expected by the end of March.
Source;
http://www.autonews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20130318/OEM02/303189967/accavitti-expands-honda-role#axzz2NzahINOk
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