Brands unscathed

“Antonio Filosa surprised everyone with the announcement that all brands are to continue,” Schwope said.

“The Maserati name really only has a good ring to it these days; sales figures, on the other hand, are appalling. In terms of image, the brand could carve out a niche between Mercedes-Benz and Ferrari. But its decline in recent years has been alarming,” Schwope said.

“Lancia is really only a brand of relevance to Italy now, although this could certainly be achieved through badge engineering. Citroën, Opel, Chrysler and DS are a bit like the unloved children that still need to be kept on the books. Not all brands will survive the next decade. The group’s future is likely to lie in closer cooperation, possibly even a merger with a Chinese group,” Schwope said.

Steve Young, managing director of the automotive retailing consultancy ICDP, had expected what he called a “culling of the brands and models, particularly in Europe."

In his weekly blog, Young said the five-year plan talked about alliances and collaboration with the objective of improving brand coverage from 50% to 90%.

“This does not address the ‘elephant in the room’ of a huge overlap between Stellantis brands in the same segments, which only makes sense if there is high customer brand loyalty – something that is in decline. The national sales companies and dealer networks may cry out for a full product range, but if customers cross-shop between brands and deals, there is little upside,” Young said.

Not all is clear

Pedro Pacheco, senior research director at Gartner Group was among analysts seeking answers.

“After a long wait, Stellantis’s new strategic plan came with a bang, but not all is clear,” Pacheco said in a LinkedIn posting.

“The overarching figures show ambition – after all, €60 billion is a big, fat number. However, the ‘how’ requires more detail,” he said.

Pacheco said despite all those brands Stellantis has lost a quarter of its market share since its inception and needs to recover lost sales.

“Stellantis has been quite busy building all sorts of partnerships. These may lead to lower costs but many of these will also force it to share revenue with partners. Moreover, it also leads to a significant increase in complexity to manage, on top of the long list of brands it has to manage,” Pacheco said.

“It’s also not clear how the company will develop more competitive EV technology to increase its market share. Using platforms from Chinese (manufacturers) seems to be the plan, but that implies a growing dependency on those companies. The more the dependency increases, the harder it will be for Stellantis to strengthen its own EV capabilities,” Pacheco said.

Still work to do

Investment researcher Bernstein agreed that progress had been made, but there was still much work to do.

“We are not convinced that the Stellantis management team has achieved the necessary level of credibility for its (strategic plan) 2030 objectives of 7% Group AOI (Adjusted Operating Income) and €6 billion ($7 billion) Industrial Free Cash flow in 2030 to be accepted without question. Stellantis remains firmly rooted in “show me” territory,” Bernstein said a report. Bernstein rates Stellantis “Market-Perform”.

Shares in Stellantis initially fell sharply after the strategic plan was unveiled late last week. The Financial Times said the shares dived up to 7% before stabilizing. According to Reuters, the shares advanced nearly 1% Tuesday to close at €6.76.