After a resoundingly successful career at General Motors – culminating in his position as vice president of worldwide purchasing – Bo Andersson was appointed president and CEO of the GAZ Group in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia in 2009.

Anderson was confronted with a great deal of adversity, including a crumbling company structure and immense financial instability. He had to immediately deal with multiple internal issues, including corruption, theft and employee drinking.

He made a decision to reduce the workforce by nearly 50,000 employees and halt production of the Volga Siber and GAZ-branded vehicles completely, which was not well received by the Russian community. And he challenged Russian president, Vladimir Putin, to fix the country’s business practices and end corruption.

As a result, in 2011 the GAZ Group achieved the best financial results in the company’s history.

Anderson has been leading the company to develop new vehicles. In 2012, the company presented the GAZelle NEXT, new generation of light commercial vehicles to be launched in March 2013. The vehicle features a state-of-the-art safety system, excellent reliability and comfort, and best-in-class cost of ownership.

In addition, he secured enormous contracts for GAZ Group to build cars under contract for Volkswagen Group, General Motors and Mercedes-Benz.