Polestar names new North America leader
This story was originally published on Automotive Dive. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily Automotive Dive newsletter.
Polestar named Rick Bryant as its new head of North America, effective May 12, the EV maker announced.
Bryant was most recently Polestar's head of operations, per his LinkedIn profile. He also has more than three decades of experience in the automotive industry, holding several executive roles at Volvo Car USA.
Kristian Elvefors, chief commercial officer at Polestar, said in a statement that Bryant has advanced the company's transformation into a sales-driven organization in North America.
'His leadership and deep industry expertise make him ideally suited to guide the next phase of our growth,' Elvefors said.
Bryant will succeed Anders Gustafsson who departed the company May 11, per the release.
Gustafsson has served as president of Polestar North America since July 2024, according to his LinkedIn profile. Prior to joining Polestar, he was SVP Americas and president and CEO of Volvo Car USA.
Volvo once held a majority interest in Polestar, but has been gradually reducing its stake. Volvo's parent China-based Zhejiang Geely Holding, also a Polestar investor, has since increased its ownership position in the EV maker. In Q1, Polestar saw a 76% year-over-year increase in global sales of more than 12,300 vehicles.
Recommended Reading
Polestar's US customers gain Tesla Supercharger access
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Bloomberg
30 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
Enterprise Products Says US Set to Deny Its China Ethane Export License
Enterprise Products Partners LP received a notice saying the US intends to deny licenses for three proposed cargoes of ethane heading to China as the Trump administration doubles down on security for exports to the country. The Houston-based midstream energy company has up to 20 days to issue a rebuttal to the notice from the Bureau of Industry and Security at the US Department of Commerce, Enterprise said in a statement Wednesday. The cargoes contain about 2.2 million barrels of ethane.
CNN
35 minutes ago
- CNN
Why Trump has struggled to get Xi on the phone to talk trade
For months, President Donald Trump has suggested his personal relationship with China's Xi Jinping will be what unlocks the world's most consequential trade dispute. Yet he couldn't get Xi on the telephone for weeks. The long period of silence between the leaders will — at least in the White House's telling — come to an end this week. A string of US officials have all but confirmed a call between Trump and Xi is imminent and could occur as early as Thursday, even though Beijing remains tight-lipped. 'I am afraid we don't have comments for you right now,' a spokesman for the Chinese embassy in Washington said in response to questions about the forthcoming conversation. The discrepancy in how each side was talking — or not talking — about the call ahead of time only underscored the widening gulf between the world's two largest economies. Each side seems convinced the call could fall through at any moment. And it's not only fights over tariffs, critical minerals, jet engine parts or computer chips that have caused a rift. It's also a matter of the two leaders' vastly different styles. While Trump is eager to apply his dealmaking tactics directly with Xi, his model of leader-to-leader haggling is entirely at odds with how Chinese officials approach global negotiations. Deeply wary of Trump's unpredictability and track record of putting foreign leaders in awkward or embarrassing situations, Chinese officials had put off a phone call, according to people familiar, even as Trump stated on multiple occasions this spring that he expected to speak with Xi soon. His Oval Office ambushes of Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and South Africa's Cyril Ramaphosa caught the attention of officials in China, those people added, and officials wanted to avoid anything similar, even in a private conversation. Former Trump and Biden administration officials describe meetings and calls with Xi as heavily scripted. Little is left to chance, they said, and even the small items – like timing and translation – are heavily negotiated among staff ahead of time. When President Joe Biden met Xi outside San Francisco two years ago, details as minute as the type of flowers sitting on the table between the two men were subject to delicate and intense discussions between the two sides, officials said at the time. On phone calls with US presidents, Xi typically reads directly from prepared talking points that are often verbatim of what he's said in previous conversations, the former officials said. When Xi briefly put down his script to offer off-the-cuff reminiscences during his final meeting last year with Biden – a man he'd known for more than a decade – US officials regarded it as a major show of respect. The stilted format makes it nearly impossible to delve into specifics that haven't been agreed to ahead of time. Any actual negotiation on trade deals or joint statements often happens among staff weeks or months ahead of time. That is not how Trump prefers to operate. As his press secretary said this week, his is a 'top-down approach,' where policy discussions originate from the Resolute Desk. 'He's very much involved in literally every policy discussion and decision that takes place,' Karoline Leavitt said Tuesday when questioned about a reduction in the size of Trump's National Security Council. That has been especially true on China, according to officials. Trump regards securing a new agreement with Beijing both as a critical component of his broader trade agenda and as a necessary follow-up from his first term, when trade deals with China got derailed during the Covid-19 pandemic. Trump views his relationship with Xi through a personal lens, harkening back to their interactions during his first term. It only took 76 days after Trump's 2017 swearing-in for Xi to fly to Mar-a-Lago, where he was served a 'beautiful' piece of chocolate cake and serenaded in Mandarin by Trump's granddaughter. Xi has proven far more difficult to reach in Trump's second term – and he's shown no similar rush to pay a visit to Florida, frustrating the US president. The last time Trump is known to have spoken with Xi was on January 17, days ahead of his second inauguration. 'It is my expectation that we will solve many problems together, and starting immediately,' Trump said afterward. But the problem-solving did not start immediately. Instead, the relationship between the two countries quickly worsened after Trump applied stiff new tariffs that eventually rose to 145%. China retaliated, creating a tit-for-tat trade war that has expanded over the course of Trump's five months in office. Talks last month in Geneva, which were intended to alleviate tensions, at first appeared to yield some progress – both sides vowed to lower some of the tariffs. But weeks later, the US accused China of reneging on an agreement to ease restrictions of certain critical minerals used to produce magnets. And instead of improving, the trade war has expanded into a battle over supply chains, which both countries see as essential to their respective national security needs. Trump has expanded punitive measures toward China to include revoking visas for Chinese students studying at American universities and restricting the export of certain software used to design advanced semiconductors. The worsening tensions emphasized the need for the two leaders to speak directly. 'The trade teams on both sides have determined that this needed to be elevated to the top,' a senior White House official said of the impending call. Trump is expected to bring up the pace at which China is exporting critical minerals – he believes Beijing is intentionally moving slower than promised during the Geneva talks, that official said. Another official said they expected Trump to do some level-setting: Trump has said publicly that China will suffer from the lack of a trade deal, a belief held by many administration officials, which in their view gives them leverage in talks with the superpower. 'I'm confident that when President Trump and Party Chairman Xi have a call that this will be ironed out,' Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said over the weekend. For his part, Trump seemed to be mulling the looming conversation in the wee hours this week. 'I like President XI of China, always have, and always will, but he is VERY TOUGH, AND EXTREMELY HARD TO MAKE A DEAL WITH!!!' Trump wrote on Truth Social at 2:17 a.m. on Wednesday.
Yahoo
43 minutes ago
- Yahoo
US State Department's planned layoffs may violate court order, judge says
By Daniel Wiessner (Reuters) -A federal judge in California on Wednesday said her recent ruling barring President Donald Trump's administration from laying off tens of thousands of federal employees likely blocks the U.S. State Department's reorganization plan that includes 2,000 job cuts. U.S. District Judge Susan Illston in San Francisco during a virtual meeting in a lawsuit by unions, nonprofits and municipalities said she was concerned that the State Department is flouting her May 22 order that broadly blocked government-wide mass layoffs. Illston temporarily blocked about 20 agencies, including the State Department, from carrying out plans to downsize and restructure federal agencies at Trump's direction. But the department told Congress last week that it still planned to notify about 2,000 employees this month that they were being laid off and would reorganize or eliminate more than 300 bureaus and offices. 'At this point there are some semantics being bandied about, but it appears to me that what is being implemented at the State Department now is covered by the injunction,' said Illston, an appointee of President Bill Clinton, a Democrat. Illston ordered both sides to file briefs on the matter next week and said she would hold a hearing by June 13, the earliest date that State can issue layoff notices after it submitted its plan to Congress. In her May ruling, Illston said the White House cannot order the restructuring of federal agencies without authorization from Congress. The Trump administration has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to pause Illston's decision while it appeals, after a San Francisco-based federal appeals court refused to permit the pause. Illston's ruling was the broadest of its kind against the government overhaul that was spearheaded by Trump ally Elon Musk, the world's richest person and CEO of electric vehicle maker Tesla. Musk last week said he was ending his stint with the administration, raising questions about the future of his Department of Government Efficiency. During Wednesday's 30-minute meeting, U.S. Department of Justice lawyer Andrew Bernie argued that the State Department's reorganization plan predated a February executive order and subsequent White House memo directing mass layoffs, placing it outside the scope of Illston's decision. 'We of course recognize and take with the utmost seriousness our obligation to comply with the injunction, and we are complying,' Bernie said, adding that 17 federal agencies have halted planned layoffs. But Danielle Leonard, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, countered that State Department documents and statements regarding the planned layoffs specifically reference orders from the White House. 'We've heard some things from Mr. Bernie today, but we haven't seen anything sworn under penalty of perjury saying this was … independently done,' she said. Illston had convened Wednesday's meeting after the plaintiffs in a filing late Tuesday accused the State Department and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development of not complying with her decision. They said that HUD had fired about 80 employees who had not completed a probationary period, which Bernie on Wednesday confirmed. But he said that agencies have broad latitude to fire probationary workers, and those terminations were not the same as the mass layoffs of tenured employees that were blocked by Illston. Probationary workers typically have less than a year or two in their current roles, though some are longtime federal employees in new positions. Illston said it was not clear to her whether the firings at HUD were covered by her injunction.
