PH caught up with Aston’s new(ish) CEO, Adrian Hallmark, recently and attempted to chew through some of the issues that make running a major carmaker in 2025 seem about as predictable as a clown in a minefield. Even allowing for his default optimism, the former boss of Bentley was remarkably chipper: he has already discussed his short-term strategy at length, and Aston’s leisurely uptake of battery technology - partly slowed on his instructions - looks increasingly prescient.
Conditions in the US could obviously be more favourable, although the willingness of the UK government to listen to Gaydon’s input has been predictably well received; not least in its acceptance that manufacturers of Aston’s comparatively small size should be permitted to continue making and selling high-powered petrol engines for another decade. Quite what its mid-term powertrain strategy will look like remains under wraps till later in the year. And though Aston has numerous hurdles still to negotiate, Hallmark continues to give off the inimitable confidence of a man with a plan - one supported by his chairman.
At any rate, it’s hard to imagine him willingly trading places with Oliver Blume, the current CEO of Porsche. Ahead of revealing its first quarter results, the firm’s Executive Board has chosen to ‘adjust’ its forecast for 2025 in the face of numerous challenges, among them ‘geopolitical conditions’ familiar to anyone who has opened a newspaper recently. How much of an adjustment? Well, it expects sales revenue to potentially fall by as much as 3 billion euros, and its return on sales - previously forecast between 10 and 12 per cent - to fall to between 6.5 and 8.5 per cent. Automotive net cash flow margin, once expected to be between 7 and 9 per cent, might drop as low as 4 per cent.
“As we expected, the first quarter has been weaker,” said Dr Jochen Breckner, CFO. “In addition, the macroeconomic situation will remain challenging. We can't completely escape this, but we are doing everything within our power to counteract it.” Porsche reported that around 1.3 billion euros in additional expenditure - described as ‘’short-term burdens - had been required to adapt the product portfolio and make organisational adjustments aimed at increasing the firm’s resilience.
In the first three months of 2025, Porsche delivered 71,470 cars, compared with 77,640 in 2024. The share of electrified vehicles has risen to 39 per cent (including plug-in hybrids) mostly driven by the new Macan. Nevertheless, Porsche blamed the ‘slower ramp-up of electromobility’ for its decision not to expand the production of high-performance batteries by its Cellforce subsidiary. The wider downturn in China, which has led to a collapse in the demand for luxury EVs, looms over many of Porsche’s forecasts; its deliveries there fell 42 per cent in Q1. Unsurprisingly, nothing that happened in the first part of this year has encouraged much optimism for the immediate future.
Quite the opposite. Porsche suggests that while the impacts of US import tariffs have (or will) negatively impacted April and May - effects it has taken into account when adjusting its forecast - it has not attempted to predict further repercussions of the policy. Why not? Because ‘currently it is not yet possible to make a reliable assessment of the effects for the financial year’. Just what carmakers love: uncertainty. There ought to be no shortage of that in 2025. Or of additional announcements not unlike this one.
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