Cooperation with Georgia Institute of Technology

Atlanta/Munich. A high-level delegation from the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) visited BMW Group headquarters in Munich in connection with the future cooperation between the college and the automobile manufacturer. Oliver Zipse, head of Technical Planning, Dr. Thomas Lehmann, head of the Munich plant and Hubert Schurkus, head of Corporate Human Resources, Strategy and Targets, welcomed guests including Georgia Tech President G.P.  “Bud” Peterson and John Brock, a Georgia Tech alumnus and CEO of Coca Cola Enterprises.

Intensive knowledge and technology transfer will benefit both parties. The BMW Group is confident that Georgia Tech students will prove a source of new impetus; in return, BMW Group will share industry topics and challenges with Georgia Tech and its young academics. Georgia Tech’s close proximity also makes it particularly attractive to the BMW plant in Spartanburg.

Josef Kerscher, head of the BMW plant in Spartanburg: “The Spartanburg plant is looking forward to exciting projects with Georgia Tech and hopes this collaboration will be highly successful on both sides.”

During the Georgia Tech delegation’s visit to Munich, Oliver Zipse noted: “Cooperation with Georgia Tech should provide new impetus for our production and assembly locations worldwide. The collaboration will enable both the BMW Group and Georgia Tech to exploit their strengths in industrial engineering and production systems in preparation for increasing internationalisation.”

Cooperation will initially focus on research in the field of production. The partnership’s first concrete steps will include a number of post-graduate scholarships at the H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering.

The BMW Group is currently restructuring its global university cooperation programme, targeting strategic partnerships with selected international colleges such as Georgia Tech. Current and future fields of research will form part of the cooperation – for instance, on the technology side: production, new drive technologies, materials and substances. Supply chain management will be a further area of research.

The BMW Group

The BMW Group is one of the most successful manufacturers of automobiles and motorcycles in the world with its BMW, MINI, Husqvarna Motorcycles  and Rolls-Royce brands. As a global company, the BMW Group operates 25 production and assembly facilities in 14 countries and has a global sales network in more than 140 countries.

In 2011, the BMW Group sold about1.67 million cars and more than 113,000 motorcycles worldwide. The profit before tax for the financial year 2011 was euro 7.38 billion on revenues amounting to euro 68.82 billion. At 31 December 2011, the BMW Group had a workforce of approximately 100,000 employees.

The success of the BMW Group has always been built on long-term thinking and responsible action. The company has therefore established ecological and social sustainability throughout the value chain, comprehensive product responsibility and a clear commitment to conserving resources as an integral part of its strategy. As a result of its efforts, the BMW Group has been ranked industry leader in the Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes for the last seven years.

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