In an unexpected move, Ray Young will relinquish the GM CFO title but stay on as International Operations Vice President.
Long expected to leave the automaker after helping guide it through its brush with bankruptcy, Chief Financial Office Ray Young will instead stay on as part of General Motors new management team. But the Chinese-born CFO will now head over to GM’s critical International Operations.
A new CFO is expected to be brought on board within the next few weeks, according to a broad hint by Chairman and Acting Chief Executive Ed Whitacre, Jr. As IO’s new Vice President, Young will now focus his talents on managing the international units finances, along with other duties that will be “clarified in the near-term,” according to a GM news release.
The 47-year-old executive took on the CFO role in March 2008, replacing Fritz Henderson, himself a veteran from GM’s International Operations. Henderson went on to become Chief Executive Officer, in March of this year, replacing Rick Wagoner, who was ousted by the White House “auto czar.” (Henderson was himself fired, last month.) Young helped manage the tricky finances of a Chapter 11 filing but, shortly after GM emerged from bankruptcy, in July, it was announced that the executive would be leaving his post.
The search for a replacement CFO has been complicated by the restrictions on pay enacted by the White House for those companies that have received a federal bailout. The U.S. Treasury currently owns 60% of the long-troubled automaker, though GM is under intense pressure to pay back the government’s loans and then stage an IPO to recoup the rest of the Treasury’s investment.
Young is expected to retain his CFO duties for the short-term, until a replacement is announced. Last week, during a media webchat, Whitacre indicated that could happen in “two to three weeks,” which would suggest the search will wrap up before the end of the year.
“Ray has been instrumental in leading the company through an extraordinarily complex bankruptcy,” Whitacre said in the statement announcing Young’s move to International Operations. “Ray’s vast global experience and financial expertise will be essential in managing the challenges and dynamics of growing our international business.”
Young joined GM in Canada, where his family had moved when he was a child. He then went on to the company’s treasurer’s office, in New York, which has served as a training ground for a number of senior executives, including both former CEOs Wagoner and Henderson.
Young has served several assignments abroad, including a stint in Japan, working with GM’s affiliate, Suzuki, and later to South America, where he served as president of GM do Brasil. He has also served on the maker’s Asia-Pacific strategy board.
Overseas operations have become steadily more important for GM, in recent years, and now account for roughly half of its total unit sales.