STEVE BEELER
Steve Beeler’s Special Situations practice targets private equity investment firms, turnaround management specialists, and companies with exceptional operating leverage. Steve came to PMC from Ford Motor Company. During Steve’s twenty years at Ford, he launched Explorer and Windstar, guided North America assembly and stamping plants through the ISO 9001 registration process, developed a total plant simulation process, and assembled cross-functional/multi-national teams to model enterprise profitability. Steve holds a BSME from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a MBA from Indiana University, and is a professional engineer. He is a member of the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE), Turnaround Management Association (TMA), and the Association for Corporate Growth (ACG). Steve is co-chairman of the Formula Ford 40th Anniversary organizing committee and is de facto commissioner of the East/West Challenge series. Steve resides in Plymouth, Michigan with his wife, three teenage daughters, and two Labrador Retrievers.
KEVIN KOHLS
Kevin Kohls is Director, Theory of Constraints, Simulation, & Scheduling. Kevin came to PMC from Soar Technology where he was the Executive Vice President of Operations. Previous to that, he had a distinguished 29 year career at General Motors. His last position at GM was Director of Throughput Analysis and Simulation where Kevin and his team generated over $2 billion in dollar throughput improvements. At GM, Kevin won the Franz Edelman Award, the Chairman’s Honors Award for business accomplishments, and the Boss Kettering Award for innovation. Kevin is a Theory of Constraint’s Jonah’s Jonah and is certified by the TOC-ICO in Production, Finance and Measures, and Thinking Processes. Kevin has a Master’s Degree in Electrical Engineering from Purdue University and a Bachelors degree, also in EE, from the General Motors Institute which is now known as Kettering University. Kevin is married and lives in Novi, Michigan with his wife, two dogs, and a cat.
MIKE RICARD
Mike Ricard is a Director at PMC. Mike is one of the country’s leading experts on the Toyota Production System, also known outside of automotive as Lean Thinking. Mike’s Lean Thinking experience began over 20 years ago in Japan where he began studying Toyota’s production and management techniques under his father’s guidance. In Mike’s 15 years with General Motors, he applied Lean Thinking to a number of non-production areas eventually leading to healthcare delivery. Mike has worked with globally recognized healthcare institutions: Mayo Clinic, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, Cleveland Clinic, and Johns Hopkins Medicine. Mike continues to enjoy applying Lean Thinking in “traditional” manufacturing environments. Mike is a graduate of Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan and is a member of the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI). Mike enjoys boating with his wife and two sons.
PAUL S. SANDHU
Paul S. Sandhu is the Executive Director at PMC. Paul has 15 years of packaging and material handling consulting experience across a variety of global industries. Paul is also a holder and referenced in several functional packaging patents. He is currently active in cutting edge packaging industry groups: the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM), International Association for Packaging Research Institutes (IAPRI), International Safe Transit Association (ISTA), and the Institute of Packaging Professionals (IoPP). Prior to consulting, Paul was a Senior Manager at International Paper and Director of Operations at the E.L. Hollingsworth Group. Paul has Bachelor and Master of Science Degrees in Packaging as well as a MBA in supply chain from Michigan State University. Paul is a family man with lifetime achievement aspirations for the “perfect” golf score and a two hat trick hockey game.
ONUR ULGEN
Onur Ulgen, PhD is the founder and President of PMC. Onur’s present consulting and research interests include simulation and scheduling, mathematical optimization, Lean Thinking, supply chain optimization, and product portfolio management. Under his leadership, PMC has grown to be one of the largest independent operations and industrial engineering firms in North America. Onur and the PMC staff have completed over 5000 productivity improvement projects for over 600 companies including Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, Toyota, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Michigan, General Electric, Johnson Controls, Merck, Northrup Grumman, Sara Lee, Sony, St. Johns Hospital, and Whirlpool. Onur holds a BSME from Bogazici University in Turkey, MSc and PhD degrees in Industrial Engineering from Texas Tech University, and is Professor of Industrial / Manufacturing Systems Engineering at the University of Michigan-Dearborn. Onur is currently writing a series of books on applying simulation tools to solve manufacturing problems. Onur is a member of the Institute of Industrial Engineers (IIE), American Production and Inventory Control Society (APICS), and the Michigan Simulation Users Group (MSUG). Onur has published more than 50 papers in operations research and industrial engineering and has managed over 100 large-scale simulation projects. Onur and his wife enjoy long hiking adventures (recently in the Austrian Alps) and biking trips (frequently spotted on their tandem bike between Ann Arbor and Dexter) in addition to listening and playing classical music.
STEVEN WEISS
Steven Weiss is Director of IT Services at PMC. Over the last thirteen years, Steven has built applications and led deployments for dozens of customers in the U.S. and overseas. Steven brings a user orientation and a systems interoperability perspective to engagements. His functional areas of expertise include software development and network engineering. He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Physics from the University of Michigan – Ann Arbor and a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science from the University of Michigan – Dearborn.