LKQ Corp. to get new president

LKQ Corp. President and CEO Dominick Zarcone intends to retire from his role effective June 30, 2024. The Chicago-based company’s board of directors unanimously selected Justin Jude, current senior vice president and president of LKQ’s Wholesale – North America segment, to succeed Zarcone as LKQ’s next president and CEO. In the interim, Jude has been appointed to serve as LKQ’s executive vice president and chief operating officer from Jan. 1, 2024, until he succeeds Zarcone July 1, 2024.

“Today’s announcement is the culmination of a succession planning process that the board initiated more than a year ago,” LKQ Chairman Guhan Subramanian says. “Justin’s almost 20 years of service to LKQ has been marked by outstanding performance, excellent leadership and sound judgment. The board is confident that Justin is the right person to be our next CEO and execute the Company’s long-term strategy.”

Subramanian thanked Zarcone for his contributions to the company’s success, saying he “mentored and developed a world-class leadership team, established a people-first culture throughout the organization, established the company’s operational excellence initiatives and produced solid financial results.”

“It has been an absolute honor to serve LKQ over the past nine years as we have expanded and strengthened our global businesses and leadership teams,” Zarcone says. “Our success is the product of the tireless efforts of our greatest asset—the 51,000 team members who make LKQ truly special. Importantly, we started on an operational excellence journey in late 2018 and have achieved tremendous progress. Nowhere has that been more evident than in our Wholesale – North America segment which, under Justin’s direction, has significantly expanded margins and improved cash flow all while enhancing our leading market position. Time and again, Justin has proven himself as both a strong operating executive and an effective leader who definitively embodies LKQ’s values. The board’s decision to appoint Justin as my successor will ensure the continuation of the operational excellence program and maintain the employee-focused culture that is critical to our continued success.”

Jude has been with LKW since 2004. During his tenure, he has held various leadership roles across the company’s North American Sales, Supply Chain and Information Systems departments. From June 2014 to July 2015, he served as president of the Specialty segment. Since July 2015, he has served as president of its Wholesale – North America segment, having produced notable financial results and developed a solid leadership team, according to the company.

Jude currently serves on the board of directors of Swedish company MEKO, a distributor of automotive spare parts in northern Europe.

“LKQ has an extraordinary history and an extremely bright future, and it will be my honor to guide and work alongside the best team in the industry in our ongoing pursuit of our mission: to be the leading global value-added and sustainable distributor of vehicle parts and accessories,” Jude says. “With the experience I gained leading our Specialty segment years ago and our Wholesale – North America segment for the past eight years, I look forward to driving organic revenue growth while implementing our lean operating model across our entire organization and focusing on execution as CEO of LKQ. I will do my best to continue to cultivate our exceptional culture, which differentiates LKQ from its competitors.”

The company also says Zarcone and Jude are assumed to be included on the slate of nominees for election as members of the LKQ board of directors at the annual stockholders meeting May 2024.

LKQ Corp. provides alternative and specialty parts to repair and accessorize automobiles and other vehicles. LKQ has operations in North America, Europe and Taiwan and offers its customers a broad range of original equipment manufacturer recycled and aftermarket parts, replacement systems, components, equipment and services to repair and accessorize automobiles, trucks and recreational and performance vehicles.