HARLEY-Davidson has hired former General Motors engineer Jim Federico as its new Vice President of Engineering. Federico had spent nearly 36 years at GM and retired as the company's Executive Director of Global Vehicle Integration in May this year.
Federico has worn many hats during his time at GM, but he has been in the news recently as GM's "champion" of an airbag failure investigation that resulted in a team of GM engineers he was appointed to discovering an ignition switch defect - a fault that has been linked to 13 deaths since 2004, and prompted the recall of more than 2.6 million Chevrolet, Saturn and Pontiac vehicles.
Harley-Davidson spokeswoman Maripat Blankenheim is reported to have told a Milwaukee newspaper that Harley had been talking to Federico “for some time” before the announcement was made.
GM has said that Federico made his own decision to retire from the auto maker, and that the decision was not directly related to the switch issue. GM has recently split its engineering department into two divisions, and John Calabrese, GM Vice President of Global Vehicle Engineering, also retired during the change.
As part of his most recent role as GM’s global director of global vehicle integration, Federico was the lead engineer behind many current products including the Buick Regal/Opel Insignia, Buick Encore/Opel Mokka, Buick LaCrosse and the Chevrolet Cruze, Sonic and Spark.