Passing of the baton at Recaro Aircraft Seating Polska

In January 2015 Thomas Keller took over management of Recaro Aircraft Seating Polska. In June 2013, the 45-year-old came on board the company as Deputy General Manager and has been responsible since then for the areas of production and quality in the Polish plant of the aircraft seat supplier. Previously, the business school graduate gained extensive experience in the industrial environment. Among other things, he managed the plant of a Swedish automotive supplier in Poland and was Chief Executive Officer of the Polish subsidiary of a renowned “lean” consulting firm.

Thomas Keller is the successor of Uwe Köthe, who retired at the end of February 2015. The 65-year-old Uwe Köthe had worked at Recaro Aircraft Seating since 1995. Initially he was employed at company headquarters in Schwaebisch Hall, and from 2006 he was responsible for establishing the Polish Recaro site, which he headed until 2015. “Uwe Köthe made an enormous contribution to the success of our plant in Swiebodzin,” explains Joachim Ley, Executive Vice President Supply Chain at Recaro Aircraft Seating. “Under his leadership, the site developed very positively: While maintaining the highest quality and adherence to delivery dates, the production volume increased to such an extent that the plant quickly reached its limits in terms of space. For this reason, we doubled the available area in 2012 by adding a new building. Thus the 150,000th aircraft seat left the assembly line in Swiebodzin in early 2015.”

Thomas Keller wants to continue the success story of the site: The goal is to further expand production capacity. “In the short and medium term, we want to produce 35,000 seats per year – with the highest quality, adherence to delivery dates, and efficiency. We want to achieve this with continuous improvement and by practicing our ‘lean’ culture at the site,” says Thomas Keller. “We also want to expand the role of Swiebodzin as a local Recaro procurement location for Eastern Europe.”