Updated: Peter McDonald leaves Nissan fleet director role to join Ohme

Peter McDonald has left Nissan GB, where he held the role as fleet director, for a new role as director in charge of mobility at smart charging solutions business Ohme.

He joined the Japanese car maker in 2019, replacing Iker Lazzari who held the position for two years prior.

McDonald said: “I really enjoyed my time at Nissan but I couldn’t miss the opportunity to join Ohme, a scale-up in the Energy Technology field. As energy and mobility merge I believe new innovative customer solutions will come to the fore to support both private and fleet customers in smart charging. Ohme is in a great position to lead in this field.”

Ohme has expertise in home and workplace charging, offering both hardware and software solutions that are designed to make charging simpler and more flexible.

When joining Nissan, McDonald was tasked with pushing the brand’s electric models - including the Nissan Leaf and e-NV200 van.

Nissan redefined its fleet strategy at the start of 2020 to focus on helping companies understand the benefits to their organisation of moving away from petrol and diesel and into zero emission vehicles.

The strategic vision was also aligned to changes in company car taxation rules, which have given drivers and fleet operators added incentive to upgrade to an electric future.

During 2020, Nissan was the UK’s biggest supplier of electric vans into the true fleet market, and the second most popular EV brand overall.

The manufacturer sold a combined total of 10,674 electric vehicles (EVs) in the UK during the past 12 months. The e-NV200 secured a 66% market share.

McDonald has extensive experience of the UK automotive market, and fleet in particular, having spent almost 20 years at the Volkswagen Group, including six years leading the Seat UK fleet team.

Under his stewardship, Seat was named most improved fleet manufacturer of the year in the 2018 Fleet News Awards.

Andrea Patti, Nissan's national corporate fleet section manager, and Nic Verneuil, sales director, will assume McDonald's responsibilities until a successor is appointed.