Sergio Marchionne had a “serious illness” lasting more than a year before the longtime Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV chief died this week, a Swiss hospital said Thursday, a condition the car maker said it didn’t know about. 
 
 FCA’s statement came after University Hospital Zurich disclosed that Mr. Marchionne had received recurring treatment at its facility. The Italian-American auto maker cited medical privacy as the reason why it had “no knowledge of the facts relating to Mr. Marchionne’s health.” 
 
 ... ||||| ZURICH (Reuters) - Fiat Chrysler FCHI.MI said it knew nothing about the medical condition of Sergio Marchionne after a Swiss hospital said on Thursday it had been treating the deceased chief executive for more than a year. 
 
 FILE PHOTO: Formula One - F1 - Italian Grand Prix 2017 - Monza, Italy - September 3, 2017 Ferrari president Sergio Marchionne arrives before the race REUTERS/Max Rossi/File photo 
 
 “Due to medical privacy, the company had no knowledge of the facts relating to Mr. Marchionne’s health,” a Fiat Chrysler spokesman said. 
 
 Questions have been raised about how long Marchionne, who died on Wednesday, was ill and how much the company knew before it made the situation public. 
 
 Marchionne rescued Fiat and Chrysler from bankruptcy after taking the wheel of the Italian carmaker in 2004 and he multiplied Fiat’s value 11 times through 14 years of canny dealmaking. He was due to step down at FCA in April next year. 
 
 “The company was made aware that Mr. Marchionne had undergone shoulder surgery and released a statement about this,” the spokesperson said. 
 
 “On Friday July 20, the Company was made aware with no detail by Mr. Marchionne’s family of the serious deterioration in Mr. Marchionne’s condition and that as a result he would be unable to return to work. The Company promptly took and announced the appropriate action the following day.” 
 
 Asked whether the scope of the statement included the board and the chairman, the company declined to comment. 
 
 The announcement of the death of Marchionne, 66, one of the auto industry’s most tenacious and respected CEOs, drew tributes from rivals and tears from his closest colleagues on Wednesday. 
 
 University Hospital Zurich said earlier on Thursday Marchionne had been having treatment for a serious illness for more than a year before his death. 
 
 Marchionne had fallen gravely ill after what the company had 
 
 described as shoulder surgery at a Zurich hospital. He was replaced as chief executive last weekend after Fiat Chrysler (FCA) said his condition had worsened. 
 
 “Mr. Sergio Marchionne was a patient at USZ. Due to serious illness, he had been the recipient of recurring treatment for more than a year,” the hospital said in a statement. 
 
 “Although all the options offered by cutting-edge medicine were utilized, Mr. Marchionne unfortunately passed away.” 
 
 University Hospital Zurich declined to comment on Marchionne’s illness, but said it deeply regretted his death and expressed its condolences to his family. ||||| The Swiss hospital that treated Sergio Marchionne says the former Fiat Chrysler CEO received treatment for a serious illness for more than a year before he died. 
 
 "Due to serious illness, he had been the recipient of recurring treatment for more than a year," University Hospital Zurich said in a statement. "Although all the options offered by cutting-edge medicine were utilized, Mr. Marchionne unfortunately passed away." 
 
 The hospital said it was issuing the statement to combat rumors about how it treated the charismatic executive, who died Wednesday at age 66. He was known for reviving Fiat and Chrysler and bringing the brands together under one roof. 
 
 Questions have been raised in the media over how long Marchionne had been unwell, and whether Fiat Chrysler had been informed. The automaker said it was only made aware last week of a "serious deterioration" in Marchionne's condition. 
 
 "Due to medical privacy, the company had no knowledge of the facts relating to Mr. Marchionne's health," the company said in a statement on Thursday. 
 
 "The company was made aware that Mr. Marchionne had undergone shoulder surgery and released a statement about this," it said. 
 
 "On Friday July 20, the company was made aware with no detail by Mr. Marchionne's family of the serious deterioration in Mr. Marchionne's condition and that as a result he would be unable to return to work," it added. "The company promptly took and announced the appropriate action the following day." 
 
 Related: Marchionne was an outsider and an original 
 
 Fiat Chrysler (FCAU) had warned in its most recent annual report in February that Marchionne's ability to run the company was "critical to the execution of our strategic direction and implementation of our business plan." 
 
 "We have developed succession plans that we believe are appropriate, although it is difficult to predict with any certainty that we will be able to replace these [executives] with persons of equivalent experience and capabilities," the company said. 
 
 It's unusual for companies to require executives to disclose medical problems, according to HR professionals. However, some companies require their top brass to get annual health checks to protect their business interests. 
 
 Fiat Chrysler (FCAU) declined to comment on its health policies related to its top executives.
– The illness and death of Fiat Chrysler's fast-charging, unconventional CEO may have seemed sudden and surprising to many, but Sergio Marchionne was apparently sick for longer than anyone—even his employer—knew. That news comes to the Wall Street Journal from University Hospital Zurich, which notes Marchionne had a "serious illness" for which he sought treatment at the hospital for more than a year. In a statement issued to get ahead of "further speculation," UHZ says it gave the ailing Marchionne "all the options offered by cutting-edge medicine," though it didn't detail what exactly he was being treated for. And because of patient privacy rules, Fiat Chrysler says it was in the dark about Marchionne's issues. "The company had no knowledge of the facts relating to Mr. Marchionne's health," a company spokesman says, per Reuters, adding it wasn't until July 20 that it "was made aware with no detail by Mr. Marchionne's family of the serious deterioration in Mr. Marchionne's condition." The reason that's important is because "material" information about a company is required to be divulged to shareholders under securities laws. Whether a high-level exec's health counts as "material" can get murky, but a company can get itself into trouble if it puts out "half-truths or inconsistent statements," a Northwestern University professor tells the Journal. In February, Fiat Chrysler's annual report noted that Marchionne's hands-on involvement in the company was "critical to the execution of our strategic direction and implementation of our business plan," reports CNNMoney.