Peugeot Cuts Management Board to Four Member from Six

PSA Peugeot Citroen cut two executives from board as CEO Philippe Varin plans to end auto losses.

“To ensure the efficient implementation of the group’s strategy, a leaner management board has been set up” around Varin, the Paris-based company said today in a statement.

The changes will be effective April 2nd, the same day when Varin will have his contract extended. Frederic Saint Geours, who has been a Peugeot board member since 2009, will leave the automaker’s top executive body and become a special adviser, while Guillaume Faury, Peugeot’s development chief, will leave the company for good.

Last month Peugeot promised to reduce cash-consumption rate by 50% this year and breakeven by 2014, after is has burned 3 billion euro ($3.9 billion) in 2012. Peugeot also plans to cut its French workforce by 17% in the following two years as the auto market in Europe is expected to shrink in 2013 for the 6th consecutive year. For 2012 the automaker reported a loss before interest of 576 million euro.

“It’s not a bad thing that they streamlined the top management,” said Jens Schattner, an analyst at Macquarie Europe Ltd. in Frankfurt. “But this is just a reshuffling.”