North American Manufacturing Excellence Summit

The North American Manufacturing Excellence Summit is a premier gathering of industry leaders, manufacturing executives, and experts dedicated to exploring innovative strategies, emerging trends, and best practices in the dynamic world of manufacturing management.

April 14 - April 16, 2025

Omni Fort Worth Hotel | Fort Worth, TX

Attendees
+
of attendees are Director level and above
%
Global Organizations
+
Renowned Speakers
+

Join This Year's Conversation

NAMES gathers SVPs, VPs, and Directors of Manufacturing, Supply Chain, Operations, and Quality, Lean/CI/OpEx Executives, and Plant Managers to share insights, foster innovation, and build invaluable connections. Dive into a thoughtfully curated environment that brings together thought leaders, allowing you to explore new ideas and engage in meaningful discussions. Join the conversation at NAMES and be part of a community dedicated to pushing the limits of manufacturing success.

Featured Speakers

Year after year, we bring to the stage today's thought leaders and innovators

Chris Nielsen

Chris Nielsen is executive vice president of product support and chief quality officer for Toyota Motor North America (TMNA).

In his role, Nielsen oversees a number of functions including: purchasing and supplier development, quality, supply chain management, logistics, after sales service and accessories, and the Toyota Production System development groups.

Previously, Nielsen served as senior vice president of human resources, corporate strategy, and purchasing for Toyota Engineering & Manufacturing North America, Inc. (TEMA) located in Erlanger, Kentucky. During his tenure, Nielsen’s leadership was pivotal in the “One Toyota” Headquarters initiative resulting in a successful merger of two Toyota affiliates with distinct cultures that operated separately for over 30 years. Prior to that assignment, Nielsen was president of Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Texas, Inc. (TMMTX) located in San Antonio, Texas. From 2003 to 2006, Nielsen served as project leader responsible for the overall design and construction of TMMTX, a $1.2 Billion project.

Nielsen joined Toyota in 1987 as a buyer at its Georgetown, Kentucky plant and progressed through a series of positions including vice president of purchasing where he was responsible for overseeing over $30 Billion in parts and materials procurement.

He was the first American to participate in the management expatriation program, a year-long management development assignment with Toyota Motor Corporation (TMC) in Japan in 1999.

Nielsen holds a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering from Kettering University (formerly General Motors Institute), and an Executive Education Certificate from The Wharton School of Business.  He is a member of the Mazda Toyota Manufacturing U.S. Board of Directors and serves as Chair of the Toyota Motor North America Audit Committee.

Nielsen is also a member of the National Association of Manufacturers Board of Directors (Executive Committee), Manufacturing Institute Board of Directors, Dallas Regional Chamber, Board of Directors (Executive Committee, 2019 Chair – Largest Regional Chamber in the United States), Dallas Citizens Council Board of Directors, and Texas 2036 Donor Advisory Council.

Chris Nielsen

Executive Vice President & Chief Quality Officer

Toyota

Peter Gibbons

Peter Gibbons joined 3M in November 2021 as group president of Enterprise Operations, which brings together manufacturing, supply chain and customer operations, and is focused on optimizing the customer experience through end-to-end aligned and agile operations.

Prior to 3M, Peter served as chief executive officer of TireHub, a joint venture last mile distributor between Bridgestone and Goodyear. Possessing a wealth of experience in manufacturing and supply chain operations, Peter previously held senior-level executive positions at Mattel, Starbucks and ICI Paints North America. His growth mindset, inclusive leadership, and orientation toward developing talent and culture has helped him lead highly successful complex changes and significant transformation.

“I believe that building confidence and removing the fear of failure are key components of leadership,” says Peter. “People achieve great things when they are embraced and valued; when they are connected, not isolated; and when their intelligence and imagination are unleashed.”

Outside of work, Peter enjoys hiking, reading, and supporting the Glasgow Celtic soccer club and serves on the boards of CP Kelco and the Jesuit School of Theology of Santa Clara University. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Physics from University of Edinburgh and a master’s degree in Business Administration from Strathclyde Business School in Glasgow, Scotland.

Peter Gibbons

Group President Enterprise Operations

3M Company

Karen Jordan

Dynamic, experienced Supply Chain Sr. Executive known for collaboratively driving benchmark productivity and service results in an FMCG retail environment. Key areas of experience include US and global end-to-end Supply Chain including multiple manufacturing and warehouse locations P&L results and leadership of strategic initiatives to deliver World Class Safety, Quality, Service, Sustainability and Cost by leveraging: operational excellence, LSS, and TPM methodologies. Renowned for innovative employee engagement solutions that increase diversity, retention and engagement of leaders in front-line to senior executive positions.

Karen Jordan

Chief Supply Chain Officer, PepsiCo Beverages North America

PepsiCo

Roberto Isaias

Roberto Isaias is Executive Vice President and Chief Supply Chain Officer of Mattel. He joined Mattel in 2002. In his role, Mr. Isaias oversees all aspects of Mattel’s global supply chain, including engineering, logistics and planning, manufacturing, procurement, safety and quality, and sustainability.

Under Mr. Isaias’ leadership, Mattel has made transformative improvements across its global supply chain, reducing costs and time-to-market while also improving service to retailers. As part of the company’s Capital Light strategy, Mattel has consolidated or exited 5 factories, optimized its manufacturing footprint, reduced complexity in the system, and increased productivity of plant infrastructure.

By 2021, Mattel factories were located in China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Mexico, employing approximately 27,000 people in peak season. The company also works with leading third-party manufacturers to meet consumer demand for Mattel product.

Mr. Isaias held a variety of leadership roles at Mattel in Latin America prior to his appointment as Chief Supply Chain Officer in 2019. He served five years as Managing Director and Senior Vice President of Latin America. Previously, Mr. Isaias served as Senior Vice President and General Manager of Spanish Latin America, overseeing all of Mattel’s operations in Latin America except Brazil. Prior to Mattel, Mr. Isaias worked for 12 years at Procter & Gamble in various commercial and supply chain leadership positions.

Mr. Isaias received a degree in Engineering at Universidad Anáhuac and an MBA from the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey. He is certified in Total Productive Maintenance by the Japanese Institute of Plant Maintenance.

Roberto Isaias

Executive Vice President & Chief Supply Chain Officer

Mattel

Sean Trainor

Sean Trainor is senior vice president of HP Inc.’s Personal Systems (PS) Operations, an organization spread across 12 countries and 29 sites. PS Operations is responsible for delivering a resilient, agile, innovative supply chain that supports the PS business portfolio, which exceeds $40B+ spanning PCs, displays, peripherals, services, software, and immersive computing.

Sean joined HP in 2023 and brings more than 30 years’ experience in manufacturing, engineering, supply chain management, and product development. Prior to joining HP, Sean served as chief supply chain officer for Cynosure. His responsibilities included the operation and transformation of the global supply chain network focusing on quality, scale, and efficiency.

Sean led world-class, high-tech, manufacturing, operational, supply chain, and procurement functions.

Previously, Sean was senior vice president of Manufacturing and Distribution for Visionworks, where his teams transformed the end-to-end supply chain driving break-through improvements in service, quality, cost, and customer value.

He was also senior vice president of Global Operations Engineering and Quality at Dell. He was responsible for new product introduction, supplier and factory quality, and operations engineering for all of Dell’s products across the global supply chain. Sean’s teams formed the linchpin between product research and development and supply chain operations to enable flawless product and solution delivery.

During his 18 years at Dell, Sean also served as an executive overseeing many transformative teams. On assignment in Singapore, he led Dell’s Global Supply Chain and Fulfillment organization that focused on the end-to-end supply chain and fulfillment transformation to provide the lowest cost and best value of products for customers.

Sean earned a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from GMI Engineering and Management Institute and a master’s degree in Business Administration from Louisiana State University. He serves as an advisor to the University of Houston C.T. Bauer College of Business.

Sean is married with two daughters and is based in Houston, Texas.

Sean Trainor

Senior Vice President, Global Head of Personal Systems Operations

HP Inc.

Summer Multer

Summer Multer

Vice President Manufacturing, Industrial Supply Chain

Ecolab

Torsten Pilz

Torsten Pilz is Senior Vice President and Chief Supply Chain Officer.

Torsten has broad responsibilities for the integrated supply chain, including procurement and driving improvements in plant efficiency and working capital while continuing to enhance quality and delivery.

Prior to Honeywell, Torsten served as Vice President, Supply Chain, for SpaceX, where he was responsible for planning, purchasing, material management and logistics. He built and developed a team that supported dozens of launches a year as well as the development and production of the Falcon and Falcon Heavy Rockets, the Dragon Spacecraft and the SpaceX’ satellite program. Prior to that, he served four years as Vice President, Worldwide Operations, at Amazon.

Before that, Torsten spent eight years at Henkel AG & Co. in a series of roles, culminating in his assignment as Senior Vice President, Global Operations, and Chief Executive Officer, Schwarzkopf & Henkel Production Europe GmbH. He also worked at Strategy& at PWC and Clariant AG.

Torsten earned B.S. and M.S. degrees, followed by a doctorate in chemical engineering at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany.

Torsten Pilz

Chief Supply Chain Officer

Honeywell

Tom Carrubba

Thomas J. Carrubba (Tom) is the Vice President, Production Operations for Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control (MFC). He is responsible for leading and executing the portfolio of production programs across fifteen manufacturing sites in the US, UK and Japan.

Prior to this role at MFC, Mr. Carrubba served as the Vice President of F-35 Production Operations at Lockheed Martin Aeronautics. He was responsible for production of the F-35 Lightning II Program, which included all domestic and international production sites across the Aeronautics business area. During his decade-long support of the program, Mr. Carrubba provided leadership over the first 500 F-35’s ever manufactured.

Mr. Carrubba holds a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the New Jersey Institute of Technology and a master’s degree in Manufacturing Systems Engineering from North Carolina State University. Additionally, he earned his MBA and a master’s in Engineering Management from the Florida Institute of Technology.

During his 25 years with Lockheed Martin, Mr. Carrubba has held various leadership positions in production operations, program management and quality at the Aeronautics and Missiles and Fire Control business areas.

Tom Carrubba

Vice President of Production Operations

Lockheed Martin

Mike Bassani

Mike leads hundreds of Software Engineers and Product Directors in Power Platform. With over 18 years of experience in building products people love, I combine business outcomes with product, design, and engineering leadership. I have an MBA, a Lean Six Sigma BOK, and two US Patents.

Mike’s mission is to create disruptive and innovative solutions that directly impact the P&L. Often focused in supply chain / Ops Mike leverages his expertise in ecommerce, logistics, and product. He is proud to have launched the Microsoft Supply Chain Platform in 2022, a breakthrough product that tackles customer supply chain disruptions and recently the Microsoft Copilot Studio. He also supports early-stage tech startups focused on ecommerce or demand/supply, and serves as an Advisory Board Member at FIND AI and FirstShift.AI.

Mike Bassani

General Manager, Partner

Microsoft

Heather Bishop

Heather Bishop

Global Director Manufacturing & Operations

John Deere

Garrett Dornbrook

Garrett has spent more than 11 years in P&G’s largest and most profitable region/sector combination, Fabric Care North America. He’s had the pleasure to work on all laundry forms at 4 different locations, across 4 different functions, at 4 different levels of the company. Garrett is energized by people and opportunities to step change business results.

Garrett Dornbrook

Senior Director, Manufacturing

Procter & Gamble

David Johnson

David Johnson is the SVP, Manufacturing and Supply Chain Management. Prior to this role he was Vice President, Production Engineering and New Model Quality, Nissan North America, Inc. where he was ensuring the highest level of quality possible at the maximum output in all of Nissan’s U.S. and Mexican manufacturing operations.

Previously at Nissan, Johnson was director, New Model and Central Engineering at Nissan Motor Company, UK.

Since joining Nissan in 2002, Johnson has held a number of roles of increasing importance throughout Nissan’s manufacturing operations.

Johnson was most recently appointed to the board of directors of the Rutherford County Chamber of Commerce.

Johnson holds a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering and a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Tennessee Technological University, and an executive master’s degree in business from Vanderbilt University – Owen Graduate School of Management.

David Johnson

Senior Vice President, Manufacturing & Supply Chain

Nissan

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Highlights From Last Year

Highlights from last year

The North American Manufacturing Excellence Summit 2024 gathered top manufacturing leaders to share new ideas and collaborate on solutions that inspired a collective vision for change, shaping the future of the industry.

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