Videos ‘We need to build where we sell, that’s a fact’ | The CEO Series Volvo Cars CEO Håkan Samuelsson discusses how regionalisation increases capex needs June 8 2026 Back in 2018, Håkan Samuelsson wrote an op-ed in the FT urging governments to resist the siren song of protectionism. His call fell on deaf ears. Eight years later, tariffs and protectionism are the norm. “Free trade has been the driver for economic growth for many, many decades,” he tells fDi in the latest episode of The CEO Series. “Then, of course, the world changed. This fully globalised world with free trade will not come back. We will have a much more regionalised world.” Volvo Cars is something of an outlier in the European car industry. The Swedish brand was in dire straits in the wake of the global financial crisis. With sales cratering, its US owner, Ford, decided to put it up for sale. A then relatively unknown Hangzhou-based Geely came forward with the winning bid. Back then, a Chinese carmaker acquiring a European peer was unheard of. But in hindsight, it was a sign of times to come. Despite the initial scepticism, Volvo Cars, with Samuelsson at the helm since 2012, pulled off a remarkable turnaround. Sales recovered and the group started hiring again. Global headcount rose to more than 40,000 people today, twice as many as when Geely took over the company. Once momentum recovered, Samuelsson placed two bets that will put the group ahead of its European competitors: electrification, with plans to go full electric unveiled as early as 2017; and regionalisation, with a new facility in South Carolina giving the group a footprint across the three main economic blocs of Europe, the US and China. After leading efforts for an IPO in 2021, Samuelsson left Volvo