What changes need to be made to restore quality and profitability at Mercedes?
We have the opportunity to further enhance the productivity of plants by applying lean manufacturing. You start with engineering and go through sales and manufacturing. It’s not a revolutionary path — it’s just doing your homework in improving all your processes. If you do it well there are two impacts. One is reducing costs, and the other is improving quality because lean and clean processes do both. BMW has surpassed Mercedes as No. 1 worldwide in the premium segment. Do you believe the sharp decline in sales of E Class and C Class is over or will it continue this year? It is right that in 2005 BMW will most likely sell more cars than Mercedes. That is one yardstick. If you used a different measure, like revenues, you would see much different results. As for the C-Class and the E-Class, both are well along in their lifecycles. And every model shows a decline at the end of its lifecycle. That’s the case for the C and the E class. Was former Mercedes chief designate Wolfgang Bernhard
