The impulsive, stubborn Herbert Diess was supposed to create order in Europe’s largest industrial group. Now he has to go halfway. So is the Volkswagen system ungovernable? The brave Oliver Blume is the next to try it out.
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Thomas Fromm and Max Haegler
When Herbert Diess then also donned a black cape complete with bat ears, it might all have been too late. It was on New Year’s Eve 2021 when he posted this little video on social media. A black car roared across a VW test track, panning to the driver: the VW boss was sitting there in a Batman costume. Without a word he accelerated, on the Internet he simply wrote: Ready to go! And put a Batman emoji behind it. J