Peter Schutz

Peter Werner Schutz (April 20, 1930 – October 29, 2017) was the president and CEO of Porsche between 1981 and 1987, a time in which the company greatly expanded sales, primarily in the United States. He was a motivational speaker and co-founder of Harris and Schutz Inc., with his wife Sheila Harris-Schutz.

Early life and career Peter Schutz was born to Jewish parents in Berlin, Germany. The rise of the Nazi party led to the family fleeing to Havana, Cuba in 1937. In March 1939 they emigrated to Chicago, Illinois. Schutz grew up in Chicago, and received a BS degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Illinois Institute of Technology. In 1978 he took over the Deutz Engine Division of Klöckner-Humboldt-Deutz. Porsche told Schutz that the company was simply not working as a unit, and needed someone to bring the various divisions together.

Cancellation of the 911 was also causing low morale in the engineering department, where the 911 was seen as the quintessential Porsche. While sitting in the office of , chief of engineering, he noticed a chart that showed the evolution of the 924, 928 and 911 on the wall. The line for the 911 stopped at the end of 1981. Schutz picked up a marker, extended the 911's line off the end of the chart onto the wall, and told Bott to make it happen. In the meantime he had the camshaft and other minor fixes implemented, quickly ending the quality control issues. He also used the new 911 engine as the basis for an aircraft engine, the ill-fated Porsche PFM 3200. Racing success, improved models and, most importantly, a strong U.S. economy and exchange rate all fed into ever-increasing sales through the mid-1980s. During the Schutz tenure, Porsche worldwide sales grew from 28,000 units in 1980-81 to a peak of 53,000 units in 1986.

When the U.S. economy suffered a major downturn in 1987, coupled with a dramatic drop in the US-German exchange rate, U.S. street prices of the Porsche lineup increased dramatically. Production for all models dropped to 48,520 cars and U.S. sales, which earlier made up over 60% of Porsche sales, dropped to under half of output. In December, Porsche announced that Schutz was being replaced by , who was later replaced by and, consequently, by Wendelin Wiedeking.