A News Page to Call His Own

Inside Booz & Company, January 20, 2011

People

A News Page to Call His Own

With more than 25 years of driving strategy and operational excellence in the automotive and electronics industries, including seven years of working experience in Asia, it stands to reason there wouldn't be much about the Chinese business landscape to surprise Bill Russo.

But the Beijing -based Senior Advisor last week was as tickled as anyone to discover that Bloomberg.com has created something completely unexpected: Russo’s own news page.

The link, http://topics.bloomberg.com/bill-russo/, is a compilation of recent Bloomberg pieces in which Russo has contributed. There are nine articles in all dating to June 2010 in which he delivers commentary on many of the major aspects affecting the Chinese auto industry.

"'A page for me?'" Russo says he asked himself on discovering he had his own news page. "It's a sign of our wired world, I suppose. And it’s kind of funny because for all the interviews, articles and public speaking I’ve done through the years, this was something I hadn’t pushed for or even known about."

The news page features pieces in which Russo is quoted on a range of topics on the Chinese auto industry, from the challenges of overseas car makers in China such as General Motors, Ford and Nissan to the BYD Company's recent slide in sales and labor issues at Honda Lock Company. The articles reinforce Russo’s status as one of the foremost experts on the Chinese auto industry, while keeping Booz & Company foremost in the minds of senior executives of leading automakers.

Russo spent more than 15 years as an auto executive himself, most recently as the first Vice President of North East Asia automotive operations for Chrysler, where he negotiated and secured government approval for six vehicle programs with three different Asian partners over a four-year period. He also launched a regional holding company as well as two distribution companies, and oversaw the industrialization of the first Chrysler and Dodge-branded vehicles in Asia.

Well Done!