Germany’s Daimler AG has announced that it is considering a new corporate structure that it expects would make the company more responsive to rapidly changing marketplace developments.

Under the scheme, the existing Mercedes-Benz Cars & Vans and the Daimler Trucks & Buses business units “may be transferred into two legally independent entities,” and thus operate as the already independent Daimler Financial Service division does.

Daimler said the goal of such a restructuring would be to have the car and truck divisions take on “greater entrepreneurial responsibility.” The OEM also stated that it does not plan to divest any of its divisions. 

Bodo Uebber, member of the Daimler Board of Management responsible for Finance & Controlling and Daimler Financial Services, said in a statement that the company needs “to be as close as possible to our customers' pulse, but also to be able to react as quickly and flexible as possible to market developments and a fundamentally changing competitive environment."

The restructuring plan is not yet final. It must still be approved by both Daimler’s Board of Management and its Supervisory Board. Should the boards decide to implement the new group structure, the changes would also require the approval of shareholders. The company noted that such a motion could be voted on no earlier than at a shareholders' meeting in the year 2019.

"Daimler is today facing an exceptional challenge: On the one hand, we are more successful than ever before; on the other hand, our business is changing like never before," said Dieter Zetsche, chairman of the Board of Management of Daimler AG and head of Mercedes-Benz Cars. "Whoever aims for sustainable competitiveness and profitability must continuously evolve and adapt to rapidly changing surroundings – technologically, culturally and also structurally.

“We are following a straight-forward strategy and have decided to examine a new divisional structure for our company against this backdrop, to make sure we are optimally prepared for the challenges in the new automotive era,” he added.