General Motors Names BASF
2012 Supplier of the Year
For the ninth time in the past 11 years,
BASF has received General Motors’ (GM)
Supplier of the Year Award.
Beate Ehle, president market and business development BASF North America and
Joe Schmondiuk, vice president of global
accounts BASF Corporation, accepted the
award on behalf of the company’s Coatings
Division during GM’s annual awards ceremony at the Charles H. Wright Museum
of African American History in Detroit, MI.
“We are honored to have once more
earned this recognition from GM. It demonstrates the great commitment and capability of our team to offer the innovative
solutions that GM needs,” said Ehle.
“BASF views GM as a key partner
in the automotive industry and we are
pleased that we were able to support
them on key product launches in 2012
including the 2013 Cadillac XTS and the
2013 Cadillac ATS,” said Schmondiuk.
BASF’s Coatings Division supports
GM by combining modern paint processes
with special effect pigments and technologies. BASF offers a broad array of color solutions and development capabilities that
enable carmakers to improve productivity
and environmental performance.
“BASF helped play a critical role in
GM’s success in 2012 through their dedi-
cation and commitment to consistently ex-
ceed our expectations by being innovative,
recognizing Gipe Automotive.”
Gipe Automotive, a fourth-
generation family-owned auto
paint and parts supplier based
in Owensboro, Kentucky, has been in
business since 1931. The company has
82 employees across its two warehous-
es and 11 sales locations in Kentucky
and Indiana. Gipe Automotive became
a single-line PPG distributor in 1988
and a PPG Platinum distributor in
1995. The company has been heavily
involved with the PPG MVP program
and has taken advantage of PPG’s
many support and training programs.
Although not located in a mandatory
low-VOC area, Gipe Automotive is en-
couraging and assisting its customers
to convert to PPG waterborne products
with Envirobase High Performance,
now the company’s top-selling refinish
system.
delivering high quality products and services on time and by creating outstanding
value,” said Grace Lieblein, GM vice president, Global Purchasing and Supply Chain.
“We are thrilled to recognize BASF, who we
consider to be a world-class supplier.”
From left to right: Greg DeCamp, PPG general manager sales and marketing, automotive refinish USCS; Jay
Eberlin, refinish sales manager, Gipe Automotive; Tom Gipe, president, Gipe Automotive; Alex Gipe, business
development director, Gipe Automotive; Greg Benckart, PPG vice president, Automotive Refinish Americas.
Eastern Michigan University
and Toyota Technical
Center Receive Patents
for Automotive Coating
Technologies
Dr. Jamil Baghdachi, a professor who specializes in polymers and coatings in the
School of Engineering Technology at Eastern
Michigan University has been named a co-inventor on three patents by the U.S. Patent
and Trademark Office. Baghdachi is one
of three faculty members at the Coatings
Research Institute at the University.
The patented technologies are the result
of collaborative research between Baghdachi
and engineers at the Toyota Technical Center,
a division of Toyota Motor Engineering and
Manufacturing North America.
“Toyota is proud to collaborate with
Eastern Michigan for the advancement of
coatings technologies,” said Seiya Nakao,
president, the Toyota Technical Center.
“The real value of collaborative research
projects like this and others is reinforcing
our focus to drive new innovations and
understandings that will benefit not just
Toyota drivers but everyone on the road.”
The technologies, jointly owned by
Toyota and Eastern Michigan University,
relate to self-stratifying automotive coatings. More specifically, the patented technologies relate to coating formulations that
self-stratify into, for example, a base layer
and a top layer, which could streamline the
coating process and reduce manufacturing
costs. The technologies also control the location of pigments within self-stratifying or
self-layering coating compositions.
“The aim of emerging technologies in
coatings are to introduce sustainable multi-functional products, while improving the
economy of the application,” said Baghdachi.
“One-step processed coatings that separate
into functional layers upon curing or drying
can be regarded as a sustainable process that
reduces hazardous materials emissions, conserves energy, and improves the economy of
coating applications.” CW
12 | Coatings World
www.coatingsworld.com
May 2013
