He's certainly bold and brash, I'll give him that.
Still, I can't help but think two things:
1. If the bravado won't play well with some of the press and the larger car-buying public; especially if he "slaps" other executives out there who may understand branding better. De Nysschen is certainly product and engineering guru, but he may not fully understand how this kind of stuff plays in the court of public opinion, and;
2. If most of these decisions were made before he came on board (such as Uwe E.'s renaming scheme) and he's just putting his name on them. If so, he may be trying too hard to sell the idea that these ideas were his own -- and in doing so he could potentially piss a few folks off.
As for my opinion, I think some of these decisions are good, and some are just dumb.
Firstly, I applaud the idea of a "separation" from the rest of GM in order to create/cultivate a mindset and direction for the brand. That makes a lot of sense.
However, as others on GMI and around the web have stated, they could have moved Caddy's headquarters to another town in Michigan/outside of Detroit if they wanted to do that, without running to NYC.
And even if that was the case, why SoHo? No one in SoHo drives anyway! There's no car culture in NYC. Hell, BMW, Volvo, Benz, Subaru are running their operations out of New Jersey, not New York. At lease people in Jersey actually drive. And if you were going to locate it in NYC, why not the old GM Building, which also houses Apple's flagship NYC store, rather than some trendy area that no one will care about in 10 or 15 years?
Secondly, as per the naming scheme, I'm still scratching my head. Does it make sense from a "rationality" and "everything in it's place" standpoint? Absolutely. But that doesn't always make for good branding and marketing? Remember, we want people to form some kind of an "attachment" to their vehicle.
I've never been on the whole "give them names again" bandwagon. I was never a fan of some of the old names like Deville and Seville anyway. To me, when Caddy broke with tradition, they were signaling that they were doing something different. I applauded the move.
However, while I was on the "rationalize the nomenclature" train, if this is the best they can come up with, perhaps we should go back to regular names. With the entire segment going to some kind of alphanumeric designation, maybe it makes sense to stand out and do something different.
Alfa Romeo is giving actual names to their new products, with more on the way. Higher-end products from Rolls, Bentley, Porsche, and Maserati already do this as well. If Cadillac hopes to one day have ultra-luxury aspirations (as the CT6 designation alludes to, with plenty of room above for a raft of CT7, CT8, and CT9 vehicles), then perhaps actual names work best.
This makes sense for a few reasons.
For one, they can never have a truly "integrated lineup" as long as the Escalade exists. There's no way that they'll kill the Escalade nameplate; it's too valuable and recognizable. If that's the case, they why have an outlier? Why not just give all the cars names?
For another, Cadillac has stated that they want to create evocative designs and bring some passion to their vehicles. De Nysschen says he wants to bring "class" back to Caddy. I applaud all of that, and if the Elmiraj is any indication, those designs will hit showrooms over the next few years. But how do you get "excited" and feel "passionate" about "CT6"? Does that quicken the pulse? Does it make you feel like you'd have some "connection" to your vehicle? I may be a cynic, but I don't think it will for most people.
Don't get me wrong here. If they brought back actual names, I don't think those names should be Fleetwood or Deville or Seville or Eldorado. As sad as it is to say it, those names are "old" and conjure up images of the land yachts of yore. No amount of marketing or ad campaigning will change that in the eyes of consumers.
Rather, I would want to see new, inspiring names that go along with Cadillac's new designs and aspirations. They could have some kind of "theme" to them if they wanted. There's lots of examples out there of companies that used to do this successfully. Lancia used to name their cars after the Greek alphabet, and later, after Roman roads. Many Maseratis and VWs used to be named after various trade winds.
Couldn't Cadillac do something similar?
I understand the idea of rationality. I also understand the thought process that goes behind giving customers an instant snapshot of where a product stands in the portfolio just by observing the vehicle's name. If Uwe and Johann want to do both, maybe the solution is to "alphabetize" the actual names in order to give customers that kind of idea (i.e. "Cadillac Arion" for a subcompact; "Cadillac Bellerophon" for the compact/entry-level sedan; "Cadillac Chimera" for the mid-sizer, "Cadillac Damascus" for the fullsizer, etc).