At Volkswagen, Pablo Di Si (BA ’94) paved the way for a greener future
April 8, 2025
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This past fall, Pablo Di Si (BA ’94) led the U.S. rollout of the Volkswagen I.D. Buzz, an electrified update of the iconic VW Bus that became a symbol of 1960s American counterculture, transporting a generation of outsiders and activists to Grateful Dead shows, protest rallies, and polling stations.
But the transformational work of the charismatic Loyola finance major extends beyond advancing the legacy automaker toward a decarbonized future. As president and CEO of Volkswagen Group of America until 2024, Di Si managed some 30,000 employees and presided over a dramatic North American growth strategy marked by beefed up manufacturing capacity, rapid digitization, and a $7 billion investment in a portfolio of more than 25 vehicles. While the auto market at large inched up a mere 2.5 percent, Volkswagen grew 25 percent in the North American region in 2024, a sign of Di Si’s strong leadership.
An immigrant’s journey
The son of a window welder and seamstress, Di Si grew up in Buenos Aires, Argentina. With limited prospects in a country reeling from skyrocketing inflation, he moved to the United States at just 17 years old, seeking a university soccer scholarship. He eventually landed in Chicago, where Loyola’s Catholic tradition appealed to him as a former student at the Don Bosco School, a school founded by Salesian missionaries.
On arriving at Loyola in 1989, Di Si spoke little English and knew no one. This was a time when connecting to the Internet required a dial-up modem and 10 minutes of your day; making connections required actual facetime. Luckily, he found a welcome reception on the men’s soccer team and made fast friends. He also excelled in his economics and tax classes in Loyola’s School of Business Administration (now the Quinlan School of Business), earning a Loyola Presidential Scholarship for academic achievement. Committed to serving others, he found fulfillment volunteering regularly at aid organizations in underprivileged communities.
“The value that I learned both at Catholic school in Argentina and then at Loyola in the U.S. is to be a good person. To try to do good for society,” Di Si says. “[Executive leadership] is not just about the profits you give to shareholders.”
Rise to leadership
Di Si carried those humanistic values into his professional life, which followed a steady ascent; an accounting degree at Northwestern University, in 1996, followed by key positions at the agrochemical giant Monsanto, and the hygiene company Kimberly-Clark, the parent to brands like Huggies and Kleenex. In 2007, he moved into a high-level business development role at Fiat Chrysler and rose through the ranks to become chief finance officer.
In 2014, having completed Harvard Business School’s Advanced Management Program, he returned to his hometown of Buenos Aires to become president and CEO of Volkswagen Argentina, and later, president and CEO of Volkswagen Brazil and Latin America. Tasked with turning around the company’s slipping South American performance, he led a massive restructuring. By localizing production, seizing on renewable energy sources like solar panels and biofuels, and shifting to a digital design and prototyping model, Di Si brought Volkswagen’s Latin American segment back from the brink, shortening vehicle cycle time by six months and returning the group to profitability.
Just as notably, he significantly reduced the company’s carbon footprint. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, in 2020, he presided over the world premiere of the Nivus, the company’s first digitally connected vehicle. Full of tech features like an infotainment display, adaptive cruise control, and autonomous emergency braking, the crossover utility vehicle developed in Brazil showed the efficiency that could be achieved by a fundamental rethinking of the production process.
“The whole process of engineering was done through digital design,” Di Si says. “And when we did that, we came faster to market, with a more appealing, more connected vehicle. We polluted less. So that was huge.”
The buzz about EVs
Environmental sustainability is deeply important to Di Si, but he says the path to a cleaner planet is often obscured by the prescriptive language of government policies and mandates. While a large part of Volkswagen’s growth strategy in the U.S. under Di Si was to electrify its vehicle fleet—a portfolio of more than 25 EV models is planned by 2030—he’s adamant that electric vehicles, by themselves, won’t solve the climate crisis.
An effective carbon reduction strategy begins, instead, he argues, by considering regional differences in the energy ecosystem. In Latin America, where companies like BioFlex use agricultural waste and plant matter to produce cellulosic ethanol, that might mean relying heavily on biofuel. In Poland, where 60 percent of the country’s electricity is powered by coal-fired plants, “the more electric vehicles you sell, the worse off you’re going to be,” he says.
That’s why Volkswagen’s partnership with Electrify America, a public charging network that runs on 100 percent renewable energy, has been so pivotal to Volkswagen’s regional EV strategy. “When you look at the U.S. and Mexico, it makes a lot of sense to have an EV push because it’s clean energy and it’s going to improve over time,” Di Si says.
The value that I learned both at Catholic school in Argentina and then at Loyola in the U.S. is to be a good person. To try to do good for society. [Executive leadership] is not just about the profits you give to shareholders.
— Pablo Di Si, former president and CEO of Volkswagen Group America
Stepping down and stepping out
The jury is still out on whether Volkswagen’s investment in the ID. Buzz, and other electric cars like the ID.4 sport utility vehicle, will pay off in North America. The limited availability of charging stations and long charging times—the ID. Buzz can be charged in 30 minutes with a DC charger but can take more than 8 hours to charge using a 3-phase 16A (11 kW) AC home charger—pose significant obstacles, as does President Donald Trump’s recent executive order dismantling many current U.S. EV policies.
Still, Di Si is proud of his team’s work reimagining a legendary vehicle for the modern era. “Volkswagen has a great heritage. When you look at the past, you have the VW Bus, you have the Beetle, the Golf, you have so many iconic vehicles. With the ID. Buzz, the designers did a great job capturing the past, the heritage of VW and bringing it forward,” he says.
Ready for a change, Di Si retired this past November to take a more active role on the boards of several sustainably oriented companies. Presently, he serves on the board of directors at Lindsay, an Omaha-based smart water company that uses high-resolution imaging to help farmers monitor crop health, and Brazilian-based Copersucar, one of the world’s largest global traders of biofuels and biogas.
In May, Di Si will deliver keynote speeches at the Quinlan School of Business undergraduate and graduate commencement ceremonies. A series of discussions with Michael Behnam, dean of the Quinlan School of Business, whom Di Si met with on a campus tour in March, have invigorated his interest in becoming more engaged in the Loyola community and supporting education programs for individuals in need.
“I loved [my tour] with Michael,” Di Si says. “We connected right away, and we agreed on my getting more involved in the Loyola community. I loved his down-to-earth, straightforward approach.”
