Marchionne, the global manager who saved Fiat, Chrysler

(ANSA) - Rome, July 25 - Sergio Marchionne, who has died at the age of 66, will be remembered as a charismatic, often unusual and sometimes brusk executive who saved both Fiat and Chrysler and transformed the merged company into the world's seventh-biggest carmaker.
    Born in the central city of Chieti, Marchionne was the son of a Carabinieri police marshall and he always kept up a close relationship with the force.
    Indeed, one of the last shots of him in public stems from the handing-over of a Jeep Wrangler to the Carabinieri in Rome.
    At the age of 14 he moved to Canada with his family and there he obtained degrees in philosophy, economics and law.
    His started his managerial career in Switzerland and in 2002 he took over SGS, a giant in inspection, verification, testing and certification services.
    A year later he joined the board of Fiat, with Umberto Agnelli backing the appointment, and in 2004 he became CEO of the then troubled carmaker.
    Marchionne immediately proved to be a superb negotiator, getting a three-billion-euro bank loan and an agreement with General Motors revised.
    He was tough too.
    He staged battles to make labour contracts more flexible at the carmaker's Italian plants, leading to legal battles and clashes with the leftwing FIOM trade union. He made contract flexibility a condition for investments in the Pomigliano and Mirafiori plants, threatening to use the cash elsewhere otherwise.
    He prevailed, with workers voting to back contract flexibility, and the divisions the workers 'referendum' created between the unions were never patched up. He then opened up a new front, taking Fiat out of Confindustria in 2012, a sensational move as the company was a founder member of the Italian industrial employers confederation. One of his greatest successes was persuading Barack Obama to back the seemingly improbable merger with ailing US carmaker Chrysler at the height of the 2007-08 financial crisis.
    Marchionne saw that, although Chrysler was in trouble, it owned several brands with huge potential if revamped and marketed in the right way. Under his leadership, the merged company, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA), went from strength to strength.
    His 14 years in charge were distinguished by the launch of many new models, with the centre of gravity moving from cars for the masses to the premium segment.
    He spun off Ferrari and trucks-and-tractor-maker CNH into separate entities, revamped Alfa Romeo, registered record sales for the Jeep brand and took the group to Wall Street. A tireless worker, continually flying between Europe, North America and Brazil, he was convinced that the auto industry needed consolidation and described the sector as "half way to heaven and just one mile from hell". He was also famous for his casual look, spurning the executive suit and tie for shirts and polo-neck jumpers. He was friendly with Obama but also one of the favourites of President Donald Trump.
    Silvio Berlusconi tried to convince him to be a premier candidate for the centre-right, while relations with two other recent premiers, Mario Monti and Matteo Renzi, blew hot and cold.
    He also took over the helm of Ferrari in 2014 and was looking forward to focusing exclusively on the glamour brand after the scheduled end of his FCA stint next year.
    A heavy smoker, he loved jazz and opera and preferred a good book to night outs with other VIPs at fancy venues. When asked if he would leave an instruction manual for his successor at FCA, he replied: "there aren't any scripts. FCA is a collection of cultures and managers born out of adversity".