Volvo's Next CEO Ran Porsche in America. He Takes Over No Later Than October 2027
The Škoda chief spent five years running Porsche Cars North America. Volvo says he'll succeed Håkan Samuelsson no later than October 1, 2027 — and hasn't said how much sooner.
Volvo Cars has found the permanent chief executive it has been looking for since Håkan Samuelsson came out of retirement last year. On Sunday the board named Klaus Zellmer, the CEO of Škoda Auto, as its next president and CEO, with a start date of "no later than October 1, 2027."
That wording matters. Volvo has set a deadline, not a date, and it hasn't said whether Zellmer will arrive months earlier. Until he does, Samuelsson stays in charge and, per the company, will work with the board on the handover.
For American readers, the most telling line in Zellmer's résumé sits a decade back. From 2015 to 2020 he was president and CEO of Porsche Cars North America, according to his official Volkswagen Group biography. Volvo is hiring someone who has already run a premium brand in the market it is now trying to rebuild around.
Who Klaus Zellmer Is
Volvo describes Zellmer, born in 1967, as a 30-year industry veteran. He joined Porsche in 1997 and stayed for more than two decades, including five years leading Porsche Deutschland before the North American post. In September 2020 he moved to the Volkswagen brand's board, in charge of sales, marketing, and after-sales, and on July 1, 2022, he took over Škoda.
The Czech brand has been one of the Volkswagen Group's steadier performers on his watch. Škoda delivered 1,043,900 cars in 2025 and 555,700 in the first half of 2026, up 9.1 percent, on an 8.5 percent operating margin, with EV deliveries up 48.3 percent, according to its half-year report. Škoda says that made it the second-best-selling brand in Europe over the period.
Volvo chairman Eric Li pointed to exactly that combination in the announcement: experience "from both the high-end premium segment and high-volume brands," he said, "is an excellent fit for Volvo Cars."
What He Inherits in the US
Zellmer arrives, whenever he arrives, in the middle of a plan he did not write. On September 17, Volvo laid out 13 new models by 2030, seven of them for Western markets, and built the strategy around regionally tailored lineups as an answer to tariffs and diverging customer tastes. The one US-specific product Volvo has pointed to so far is a D-segment electric SUV.
The American business he will oversee leans heavily on two SUVs and on hybrids. Volvo Car USA sold 121,607 vehicles in 2025, down 2.9 percent, and the XC60 and XC90 accounted for two-thirds of that total, per the company. In the second quarter of 2026 sales rose 9 percent to 34,228, but fully electric deliveries fell 44.7 percent after the federal tax credit went away, while mild hybrids climbed 21.2 percent.
Volvo's answer to tariffs has been to build more in South Carolina. The Ridgeville plant, which already assembles the EX90 and Polestar 3, is due to add the XC60 in late 2026, and Samuelsson has promised a larger hybrid "primarily for America" before 2030, as WardsAuto reported last September. Whether the incoming CEO changes any of that is an open question. Zellmer hasn't said a word about product or plant plans, and Volvo hasn't suggested the appointment alters the September 17 roadmap.
Why the Long Runway
The generous timeline is easier to read against Samuelsson's own mandate. He returned on April 1, 2025, replacing Jim Rowan, on what was described at the time as a two-year term while the board searched for a long-term successor, Fortune reported. Two years from that date is spring 2027; October is the outer bound Volvo has now put on paper.
Several questions remain open. Volvo hasn't said what role, if any, Samuelsson keeps once the handover is complete. Škoda hasn't named his replacement or said when he leaves Mladá Boleslav. And there is no word yet on whether Zellmer will be in the chair for the first of the 13 new cars or will inherit them already revealed.
The next scheduled checkpoint is Volvo's third-quarter report in October. For now, the incoming CEO's own summary of the job was the most candid line in the release: after almost a century, he said, Volvo's "ability to reinvent itself time and again is both a remarkable achievement and an ongoing challenge."
