Daewoo UK chief is made redundant

Ailing car company Daewoo has made its UK sales and marketing director redundant.

Pat Farrell, who has worked at Daewoo since its UK launch in 1995, left the company on Friday. His departure leaves the Korean company without a director who is exclusively in charge of marketing and sales in the UK.

Farrell, who joined Daewoo from Rover, played a key role in the company’s direct sale, no dealer policy. He was also responsible for appointing Duckworth Finn Grubb Waters to handle the company’s &£13m business.

The move comes as Daewoo awaits a takeover by General Motors and moves away from its direct-sales policy in favour of signing up dealer franchises. The company aims to have 88 dealer franchises by the end of 2002. It claims it will stick to its direct-selling policy with its other 36 wholly owned showrooms.

Farrell is not the first senior marketer to leave the company recently. Last year, Daewoo head of marketing Dorian Leroy left the company without a job to go to and was not replaced.

A spokesman for Daewoo says the company has no plans to replace Farrell directly. Instead, various managers within the Daewoo marketing team will handle individual functions. They will now report directly to Daewoo’s managing director, Sung-Kee Kim.

The sales function will be replaced by a head of dealer development. An appointment is expected in the next few weeks.

The company aims to increase its UK market share from 1.5 per cent to three per cent over the next three years.