PETE REYES: TAURUS CHIEF ENGINEER BRINGS CULTURES TOGETHER, SEES PRODUCT TEAM AS FAMILY
- Pete Reyes is chief nameplate engineer for the 2010 Ford Taurus
- Reyes describes the Taurus team as "one great big family"
Very early in life, Pete Reyes learned how to bring diverse cultures together. Under his leadership as chief nameplate engineer, a close-knit team has delivered a stylish and technologically rich new Taurus that will appeal to new car-buyers across multiple regions, cultures, life stages and lifestyles.
“Growing up, I had the benefit of seeing the world from several ethnic and cultural perspectives,” said Reyes. “Our family was based in Flint, Mich., and my father was an accountant in the auto industry. His job took us to Caracas, Venezuela, where I attended school with kids from all over the world.”
Reyes attended the University of Michigan, where he earned his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering and a Master of Business Administration. College continued the pattern of Reyes establishing connectivity with fellow students and faculty from across the globe.
Upon graduation, Reyes entered the Ford College Graduate (FCG) training program just as the vehicle body engineering group – and the auto industry as a whole – was beginning the transformation from blueprints on a drafting board to virtual images on a computer screen.
Reyes soon was recruited into the truck and commercial vehicle engineering group within Ford.
“With trucks like the F-Series Super Duty, it’s all about capability,” he observed. “You make the truck as tough and as strong as you can, then you test it, torture it and make it even stronger.”
Most recently, Reyes was appointed chief nameplate engineer for the 2010 Ford Taurus. He was given two mandates from senior management. First was to reinvigorate the Taurus, to reclaim its place as America’s pre-eminent fullsize sedan. Second was to cut a full year from its development time.
“The compressed development time frame would not have been possible without extensive use of computer-aided design and engineering,” said Reyes. “Now the tools are so sophisticated, we can design, refine, test and assemble a vehicle in the virtual realm, then validate it in a much closer to production form.”
The speed with which the Taurus went from the screen to the showroom also required that Reyes bring all of the vehicle development disciplines together around common, unified goals.
“I treat the entire team as one great, big family,” said Reyes. “I try to be a thoughtful listener and a good coach. On a completely different level, I’m doing what I’ve done as long as I can remember, bringing people from different cultures and perspectives together.”
The result of Team Taurus – and Reyes’ – efforts is a stylish and advanced new sedan that combines an expressive design with engaging and communicative driving dynamics.
###
About Ford Motor Company
Ford Motor Company, a global automotive industry leader based in Dearborn, Mich., manufactures or distributes automobiles across six continents. With about 201,000 employees and about 90 plants worldwide, the company’s automotive brands include Ford, Lincoln, Mercury and Volvo. The company provides financial services through Ford Motor Credit Company. For more information regarding Ford’s products, please visit www.ford.com.
Sept. 30, 2009
