Ford's new man at the top

The Ford Motor Company's Executive Vice President of Asia Pacific and Africa, John Parker, has announced the appointment of William (Bill) H. Osborne to the role of President of Ford Australia.

Mr Osborne will be replacing Tom Gorman, who has held the position since March 2004. Gorman is believed to have been made an offer that will allow him to take his career in a new direction, within a new Europe-based role outside the automotive industry.

Osborne will commence from February 1, with Gorman finishing up at the end of February, allowing a few weeks' transition. The new appointment commences the same day as the assumption of managing directorship at Holden, with Mark Reuss, the new incumbent taking over from Chris Gubbey (more here).

Osborne's appointment effectively pits two product guys against each other in upper management at Australia's longest serving vehicle building concerns.

Born in Michigan, Osborne holds a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering, his Masters in Engineering and a Masters of Business Administration. In his most recent role, he has been the President and CEO of Ford Motor Company of Canada Limited.

"[Bill Osborne] has led the Ford of Canada team admirably since November 2005 and is well placed to take the Australian operations to the next level of global integration and significance", said Parker.

"Tom Gorman has been an outstanding leader at Ford Australia and has brought the company through some challenging times. He has elected to move onto other exciting opportunities outside the automotive industry and we wish him well in his new role."

Osborne's background is markedly different from Gorman's, having worked his way up through the ranks via an engineering stream, whereas Gorman's expertise lay in finance.

From 2003 to 2005, Osborne was responsible for business and product development of the Ford light truck range and, prior to that, was Engineering Director for the "Tough Truck" business group, responsible for the design and development of all commercial and personal use trucks for the North American market.

Mostly, Osborne's engineering experience has been in the area of commercial vehicles, although since joining Ford in 1990, he has been Assistant Vehicle Line Director for the mid-size sedan platform and has been Manufacturing Operations Manager at one of Ford's engine plants, as well as leading the design effort for the range of Duratec V6 engines.

Asked whether the new appointment was of particular significance to Ford Australia at this time, Sinead McAlary, Ford's local Manager, Public Affairs, said: "Not really, Bill has come up through the product development area, but he has spent the last couple of years running Ford of Canada, which is a total business, so he obviously has extensive experience in running the whole enterprise. He has a whole enterprise view, if you like.

"From our point of view, it will be good to have somebody else who has that product development background. That is not negative towards Tom at all. It's just that as we become more globally integrated, Bill's knowledge of the Ford North America product development system will probably help.

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