Dr Markus Keicher (51) will take over as the new Head of Production and Site at the Mercedes-Benz Ludwigsfelde plant as of April 1, 2020. Currently Keicher is Head of Production and Site at the Mercedes-Benz Bremen plant. He will take over from Sebastian Streuff (45), who is responsible for the transformation process of Mercedes-Benz Vans as of February 1, 2020.
"I wish to thank Sebastian Streuff for his successful management of the Mercedes-Benz Ludwigsfelde site and of Mercedes-Benz Ludwigsfelde GmbH, and I am very pleased that he will now be responsible for shaping and directing the transformation process of Mercedes-Benz Vans," said Marcus Breitschwerdt, Head of Mercedes-Benz Vans. "With his extensive experience in production and many different efficiency programs, he has the best qualifications for leading the transformation office and to contribute significantly to put Vans back on the road of success."
"We are pleased to be gaining Markus Keicher, a highly experienced production executive for our Ludwigsfelde site," said Dr Ingo Ettischer, Head of Mercedes-Benz Vans Operations. "I'm looking forward to working with Markus Keicher. With his expertise in many different production areas worldwide, he is ideally equipped to successfully lead our plant for the open model series of the Sprinter." He continued: "I wish to thank Sebastian Streuff for his outstanding dedication and his successful management of the Ludwigsfelde site, which two years ago was the benchmark in the world-wide production network when the new Sprinter was launched."
Markus Keicher studied mechanical engineering at the University of Stuttgart and he was doing his doctorate at Imperial College in London. In 1998 he joined the trainee programme of the then DaimlerChrysler AG. After a number of management and project jobs at the Mercedes-Benz Berlin site and in passenger car production, maintenance, technical service and production planning, Keicher switched to the BBAC Joint Venture in Beijing, China in 2011. There he was responsible right from the very start for setting up and starting production of the first engine production works within Mercedes-Benz Cars outside Germany, right up to reaching peak production. From summer 2017, Keicher headed engine production at the Mercedes-Benz Untertürkheim site and acted as the speaker for the entire worldwide engine production network, before taking over as Head of Production and Site Management at the Mercedes-Benz Bremen site in September 2018. Keicher's successor in Bremen will be decided soon.
Streuff has headed the Transformation Office in Stuttgart since February 1, 2020 and reports directly to the Head of Mercedes-Benz Vans. Previously, Streuff was site manager and managing director of Mercedes-Benz Ludwigsfelde GmbH for more than four years. With the efficiency and transformation initiative, which Mercedes-Benz Vans embarked upon at the beginning of 2019, important leverage was established. In order to anchor the initiative even more emphatically for Mercedes-Benz Vans, the Transformation Office, an organisation dedicated to the three pillars Performance, Strategy and Transformation, was set up.
END