Hyundai Shuffles Management Again

The guard is changing (again) at Hyundai Motor America.

H. Doug Mazza, who became the company’s chief operating officer in 1992, resigned this week after directing the Fountain Valley-based importer and distributor of Korean-built Hyundai automobiles through a slow rebuilding of its product line and reputation. Hyundai says Mazza won’t be replaced, making the company the only Asian auto importer in the U.S. without an American serving in a top slot.

Robert Parker, rehired this week as senior vice president of sales and marketing about a year after leaving Hyundai to pursue academic studies, now is the company’s top-ranking non-Korean executive. He reports to President M.H. “Mark” Juhn, who took up that job last month when his predecessor was rotated back to Korea.

What’s most notable about the new arrangement, says consultant George Peterson of AutoPacific Group in Santa Ana, is that Parker will direct the product planning department, which previously had sidestepped Mazza and reported directly to the president.

Having product planning in his bailiwick may give Parker clout that Mazza didn’t have, suggests Peterson. Mazza said he decided to leave to pursue a long-held goal of investing in an automotive-related company. He was the fourth COO at Hyundai since it began selling cars in the U.S. in 1986. A longtime import industry executive, he was hired by Hyundai to stop a massive sales slump that began in 1989 when consumers grew dissatisfied with the reliability of its no-longer-produced Excel economy car.

Also leaving Hyundai this week was sales vice president John Dorsey, who is becoming a partner in an auto dealership.

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John O’Dell covers major Orange County corporations and manufacturing for The Times. He can be reached at (714) 966-5831 and at john.odell@latimes.com.