[1] His various industry positions include general manager, and later chief executive officer, of Officine Galileo (1984–94); a managing director of Oto Melara and Breda Meccanica Bresciana (1994–96); head of Finmeccanica Defence Consortium (1996–99); chairman of the board of directors of Alenia Marconi Systems (1998–2000); chief executive officer of Fincantiere SPA and Cantieri Navali Italiani (Italy's largest shipbuilding consortium)(1999–2002).
[3] Gargauglini received an honorary doctorate from Heriot-Watt University in 2010 [4] Guarguaglini had been nominated to head the Finmeccanica group by the Italian Finance Ministry, which holds some 30 per cent of the company's stock.
They tried to determine whether executives at one of Finmeccanica's divisions, Selex Sistemi Integrati, had inflated the value of contracts with an air traffic manager, and then used the resulting funds to bribe various politicians.
By early 2011 the government (as represented by Prime Minister Mario Monti) was convinced that a top-to-bottom shakeout of Finmeccanica management was necessary, and in April 2011 they brought in Giuseppe Orsi (born 1945) to replace Guarguaglini as chief executive officer.
The dual-manager situation proved difficult, however, and on 1 December 2011,[9] Guarguaglini held a showdown with the board of directors in an attempt to more clearly define the division of responsibilities between the two managers.