Steve Beattie has been appointed as sales and operations director at Vauxhall, as he returns to brand after six years working with other manufacturers.

Most recently, Beattie was head of European fleet and sales operations at Chinese brand Nio.

His departure follows that of Former Honda fleet sales operations manager and ex-Pendragon B2B director Marc Samuel, who was UK fleet sales manager at Nio. Samuel left Nio in January to join BYD.

Nio has not started selling cars in the UK yet, due to delays in its plans to set up a network of battery swap stations. BYD's market introduction is well underway, however.

Beattie was Vauxhall's national contract hire and leasing manager when he left the British brand after 12 years to join Volvo Car UK's senior team in 2017.

The Volvo and Nio roles have broadened his experience considerably from his career's earlier focus on fleet and business sales, as he gained responsibility for overseeing all sales delivered by Volvo's retail network, including parts and service hours, and at Nio he was part of a team establishing operations for sales and charging in launch markets.

His return to Vauxhall, which is now part of Stellantis, this year coincides with the brand's ambition to have an electric variant in every model line by the end of this year.

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