General Motors Corp. named Bridgestone Corp. one of its top suppliers at its 2016 Supplier of the Year Awards ceremony. The 24th annual event was held March 10 in Detroit.
Bridgestone, which includes its Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations LLC (BATO) subsidiary, was named a GM supplier of the year for the 14th time.
the annual event honored Bridgestone for the 14th time.
“This award is a tribute to our employees worldwide who engineer the high quality tires and provide the exceptional service that outstanding partners like GM have come to expect from Bridgestone,” said Mike Martini, president of BATO's original equipment, U.S. and Canada Consumer Tire Sales Division.
Martini, alongside Gary Garfield, CEO and president of Bridgestone Americas Inc., and John Behr, senior director of original equipment account management for BATO, accepted the honor on behalf of the company.
“We are focused on building positive supplier relationships, bringing new, customer-centric innovations to GM and being the OEM of choice among suppliers,” said Steve Kiefer, vice president of GM's global purchasing and supply chain. “The companies we recognize not only have brought innovation, they delivered it with the quality our customers deserve.”
GM recognized 110 of its best suppliers from 17 countries. The number of award winners represents a nearly 40% increase in the number of suppliers honored compared to 79 recipients in 2014.
Winning suppliers were chosen by a global team of GM purchasing, engineering, quality, manufacturing and logistics executives and selected based on performance criteria in four categories: Product Purchasing, Indirect Purchasing, Customer Care, and Aftersales and Logistics.
In the U.S. and Canada, Bridgestone accounts for 30% of GM's business, according to the 2016 Modern Tire Dealer Facts Issue. The Bridgestone brand represents 17% and the Firestone brand 13%.
