Q&A with Aston Martin’s Greg Adams

To fully understand why Greg Adams returned to Japan as the regional boss of Aston Martin Lagonda is to appreciate his amazingly diverse background.

His career spans over 32 years with multiple brands including Nissan, Ford, Mitsubishi, Ferrari, Fisker and Maserati, with most of that time spent in the Land of the Rising Sun.

CE: How do you go from being a graduate of the University of South Carolina to running Aston Martin Lagonda in Japan and Korea?

GA: All I want to do is work with cars and do it internationally. My mother, an international magazine editor in the US, told me that Japan is the most suitable place. At the same time, I love Japanese cars – Honda in particular, so I came to Japan as a fresh graduate in 1989 as part of the University of South Carolina’s International Business program.

The school itself didn’t have any contacts in the auto industry, so they lined up Sony, but as soon as I got off the plane and immediately started talking to the people at Toyota, Honda, Nissan – in short, Nissan is based in Tokyo and that’s where I want to stay. And that was from 1991 to the end of 1995.

Then I moved to Ford of Japan but worked in the parts department while stationed in Yokohama but 100% focused on Southeast Asia, so I traveled to Indonesia, Thailand, Philippines and even Taiwan, where Ford has a large base.

Still in the parts business, I was sent to Singapore to work with Ford for two years but especially wanted to get back into autos and decided to go back to Japan and work for a division of Nissan, which focuses on design, vision and research of the future, but then Carlos Ghosn told us to take on projects from other automakers like General Motors APAC, Subaru, Audi and Ford.

From Japan, I went to Mexico, the Middle East, Southeast Asia to work on these strange projects. For example, I went to the Middle East to interview 14-year-olds to understand what shapes and colors they like because Nissan is looking to build a factory there and when it opens, these kids will be old enough. drive.

From there, I moved on to work for Daimler/Mitsubishi in product planning, where I worked on the next generation EVO X, which was, in fact, supposed to be a small wheelbase car. based on a show car called the Mitsubishi Tarmac. The chairman of Daimler actually saw it and said we should think about building it.

So in the end, I was tasked with looking at how to do, with the Evo platform, scale it down and win races because the massive heavy Evo X is not going to win any races. any. But the only way to make it work financially is to do something else, so I’d suggest a compact SUV depending on where in the world you are in the RVR or Outlander Sport. [ASX] For example.

When Daimler and Mitsubishi divorced, Daimler gave me the option to stay in Japan [to] work for the truck brand Fuso or go to China and help develop the Chrysler and Dodge brands – that is, find partners to build certain models.

So I went to China for three years and finally got in touch with my current boss at Aston Martin, Marco Mattiacci, who was working at Ferrari at the time and was looking for someone knowledgeable about Asia. , especially Japan as we want to win back the Japanese market as Ferrari. from the importer has had the right for 40 years, and then developed the market.

Actually, I love working with smaller cars with smaller budgets and bigger ideas but then I went to Maranello and met him, as well as Amedeo Felisa who was then President and assistant. Responsible for all engineering at Ferrari, who is now Chairman and CEO of Aston Martin Lagonda.

So I’m working for Ferrari, based in Shanghai, looking to get Ferrari back; how to work with partners, how to open a new dealership, what to do with after-sales and what is the ten-year plan. We did everything, and then Marco said, “you go to Japan and run Ferrari in Japan”.

Then Marco was sent to the US – Ferrari’s biggest market – after that, I also went back to the US and worked for Ferrari North America. In the end, Marco became F1 boss and moved back to Italy while I stayed in the US in charge of marketing, branding and motorsport.

Then I went to Faraday Futures because I had previously worked on electric vehicles in the United States with Mitsubishi and Coda Automotive, but Faraday has now become notorious.

It’s like the Apple Car, very, very futuristic with everything connected. It’s funded by a Chinese billionaire, who started the Netflix equivalent but has since expanded the model into making its own phones and TVs and selling them cheaply for a subscription deal.

When I got there, the car was almost ready and they were even considering a second model before it was ready to build the factory. I spoke to Marco and told him to come and check this out because it is the future of the automobile. He came in anyway and they put him in second place as head of commercial. We worked there for about a year before finding some unusual practices. They weren’t willing to change, so almost the entire executive team left, including Marco and I.

Marco and I then spent the next few years advising companies that were already in or wanted to get into the luxury electric vehicle business. So we worked with Karma Automotive (formerly Fisker) and invited the likes of Pininfarina to come in and design a beautiful Coupe version of the Karma as a show car.

We also worked with a company interested in buying Williams and building it into a sports car brand with the question of whether to go with a traditional internal combustion engine or an electrified platform, which we obviously proposed because Williams was contracted to build the new generation. Lotus electric car.

From there, I got a call from Maserati, who wanted me to go back to Japan because they were also using trams, but I also knew Marco was talking to Aston Martin after receiving a call from Lawrence Stroll telling about his problems. when he was a Ferrari dealer in Montreal.

And then, when Lawrence got the chance to buy Aston Martin along with other investors and in recognition of his credit, they attracted all sorts of people, many formerly Ferrari employees like Amedeo Felisa and of course Marco Mattiacci, whom I now work for.

So these are the people who really built the brand at Ferrari and now the same people are here at Aston Martin.

CE: What is Aston Martin’s upcoming vision?

GA: In fact, the vision is super clear. Some things are inherited like GT cars, some things are in progress like DBX, they tweaked and made DBX 707, and now we have things like Valhalla back then it was just a sketch in progress. people brought to life who built many mid-engined supercars for other brands.

So we have GT, SUV, mid-engine and now EV, which is another great strategy that is also being worked on – so the future is very bright.

CE: How much can you tell me about Aston’s EV aspirations?

GA: Stay tuned, because something is coming up in the near future, which I think they will talk about soon. You can see what we have to say to investors. A regulatory-compliant and zero-emissions global future means it could use electricity, hydrogen, or something else, but honestly, it’s pre-determined.

We are looking at everything. We already have a DBX mild hybrid in China that uses an inline six, but China is a unique market.

If you look at our corporate mission, Aston Martin wants to be the most coveted UK-based ultra-luxury performance brand in the world, which means you need to embrace technology and ahead of his peers.

CE: Ferrari has become exceptional when it comes to building a luxury brand with high residual value and desirable, is that the kind of success Aston is after?

GA: Mr Stroll is exactly the right man to take Aston Martin forward. He is not only a fashion billionaire, he is also a luxury fashion billionaire. He lives and breathes the world of luxury from yachts to private jets and beyond. He understands luxury better than most, but more importantly he is exactly who we want to sell to.

Because of his background, he can tell you “This is what I want to see”, and then he has all the people who have worked at Aston before who are extremely knowledgeable, as well as a huge influx of newcomers from brands like Ferrari. and others.

He understands the language, it’s luxury not luxury, and from there it’s easy to build the brand, build the product, and the steps to get there.

With that said, we will continue to add people to the main regions. For true luxury you need to have leading technology and processes for personalization, provided that you need to be able to do whatever someone asks, this is probably the area next that we focus on beyond electrification.

CE: Ferrari not only has a high residual value in the industry, but the company also offers attractive incentives such as free maintenance for seven years.

Is that something Aston Martin could consider to make the brand more appealing to potential customers?

GA: Everything is under review. We’re all new to building a brand that includes things like intrinsic value that people appreciate. The question is how do you do it and make a profit at the same time?

CE: What’s in the pipeline for Aston Martin?

ONE: If you talk to Mr. Stroll, he will tell you that we have entered the second phase of the plan. What you are about to see is a change into the product. We have a lot of new products on the way. For example, the sports car line is about to be completely revamped and that is the core of the business.

Currently, the DBX accounts for almost 50% of our total, which is significant and already in sufficient quantities we need it, while our GT cars make up the rest of the sales. . But as cars become more popular and there are different versions of things, especially when you factor in mid-engined cars, that’s okay.

As a good company with good designers, we need to be ready to do anything, not that we are doing that, but you never know where the market is going and Aston can come up with things.

Very soon you’ll see your first new sports car and when you see that, you’ll see technology, infotainment that we’ve never done before. You will be pleasantly surprised indeed but we will go further as you will see. And, we’re talking about the next few months.