Dan Kaskinen – Megawatt Winner

Sonic Automotive Inc.

Dan proactively took undefined, open-ended positions and molded his role to better suit his department while saving more than $3 million. He created a formalized partner request process with a web portal on the Sonic home page along with a submission database. He also put together a formal RFP process and a support library containing the newly created contracts, forms and templates for future sourcing events.

Andrew BagniGeneral Dynamics Mission Systems

Andrew is the principal organizer of General Dynamics’ Soldier's Network Supplier event, a critical vendor event where current

and high-potential suppliers gather for educational sessions to discuss programs, business opportunities and funding issues.

This annual event solidifies the mutually beneficial relationship between GDMS and their supply chain partners.

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Andrew BooneGraphic Packaging International, Inc.

Andrew restructured, transformed and analyzed Graphic Packaging International’s (GPI) Material Handling Fleet. This decreased the average total cost of ownership per asset by 42% across GPI’s fleet and decreased the average age of the fleet from seven to three years. Through this project, Andrew also developed a new leasing structure with GPI’s vested partner that did not exist in the equipment financing industry.

Gerardo CabreraFlex

Gerardo achieved a projected annual cost reduction of $1.1 million during his last negotiation for one of Flex's major customers. He also presented a $500,000 annual additional

cost savings initiative by using the components of the new supplier versus the existing supply base.

Kiara CondeShell Exploration and Production Company

Kiara holds engagements with a cross-functional team at Shell to identify and discuss sustainable lower cost opportunities such as investments in infrastructure and/or vertical integration, strategic supplier relationships, application of LEAN to the value chain, innovative commercial constructs that mitigate market volatility, and value engineering and target costing approaches for equipment and processes.

Abhishek DahiyaDell Technologies

Abhishek created an online analytics tool to categorize part numbers by volume and commodity for all build locations across

the globe for Dell Technologies. He also added intelligence to view eight-week inventory outlook for all part numbers at a single

source online, which reduced factory backlog. This process would predict the biggest continuity of supply issues Dell Technologies faced and help resolve issues proactively.

Amanda DeCookA.T. Kearney

Amanda spent nearly a month in Tanzania leading a supply chain diagnostic on Integral Life Saving Commodities (antibiotics, gauze, etc.) for the remote Sengerema District near Lake Victoria. She was able to make clear recommendations that would help to reduce the likelihood of stock outs in the future, hopefully resulting in more lives saved.

Sarah DiPietro3M Company

Sarah investigated and implemented changes to 3M’s “lines on time” metric for her entire division using intensive data analysis, cross-functional collaboration and best practice

establishment. Ultimately, she was able to achieve an immediate improvement to the metric.

John FowlerHalliburton

John was able to drive process improvements and scrap reductions for an annual ROI of $741,000 in one of Halliburton's largest manufacturing facilities.

Jonathan FutrykCrown Equipment Corporation

Before Jon came into the purchasing department at Crown, purchasing was not always involved early on in capital projects. Jon started making an impact by showing up at the beginning of the capital buying projects and revealed how getting purchasing

involved earlier can add value. Due to Jon’s work, there is a formal capital quoting process that Crown now uses that attributes to significant cost avoidances for the company.

Anthony GarwoodGE Aviation

In Anthony’s first 18 months with GE Aviation, he delivered and pipelined over $6 million in deflation and over $15 million of total cost out/avoidance. These savings were comprised of numerous projects and negotiations in support of 5 GE manufacturing sites. The awards made, and transition of business in some cases, resulted in 98% of spend that he is responsible for residing with two strategic partner suppliers, compared to 68% 18 months prior.

Corey GustafsonDeluxe Corporation

Corey hosted a variety of supplier/marketing collaboration events where Deluxe Corporation brings in their suppliers

and marketing partners to value engineer, standardize and look at more cost effective ways to produce their products.

He also leads many lean events, which resulted in significant cost savings, minimum order quantity, lead time reduction

and more efficient processes.

Nicholas ImisonNorthrop Grumman Systems Corp.

Nick is responsible for managing five subcontractors. He worked closely with one of the major subcontractors and the Defense Contract Management Agency and implemented a process to reduce government source inspections (GSI) and turnaround time on repairs. The new method shortened the approval process by nearly two weeks, which saved thousands of dollars.

Elaine JolliffU.S. Postal Service

Elaine manages an annual spend in excess of $118 million. She initiated discussions that led to the redesign of plastic

lids and priority mail sacks, resulting in savings of $116,000 and $1.2 million, respectively.

Teddy Lee KnoxZipline Logistics

Teddy manages Zipline's top client, which saw an average annual increase in orders of 36% and a 32% annual increase in income from 2011 to 2016.

Peter LaFaveAnthem, Inc.

Peter constructed a value-based strategic relationship between one of the four major ad agency holding companies and Anthem, Inc. After implementing strategic deals (with thoroughly benchmarked

rates and performance-based SLAs) with four agencies under this holding company, Peter recognized an opportunity to extract

additional value by partnering with the holding company.

Lisa MarieArconic (formerly Alcoa Inc.)

Lisa executed various projects for Arconic through strategic category management, which delivered more than $10 million in productivity savings over three years.

Brian MeyerOwens Corning

Brian executed major projects at Owens Corning, which yielded over $6 million in cost savings and another

$3 million in working capital improvement.

Matt MontanaPacific Gas and Electric Company

Within three years, Matt’s career at PG&E has progressed from Sourcing Specialist, to Senior Sourcing Specialist, to Category Lead. He has led multiple RFPs that led to more than $2 million in savings to PG&E. Matt also earned his CPSM certification in February 2017.

Barbara NosedaJohnson & Johnson

Barbara has flawlessly driven business results through her ability to effectively lead colleagues from a variety of backgrounds and experiences. Her leadership and focus has generated substantial savings and efficiencies for Johnson & Johnson in 2016.

Jeff NovakU.S. Steel Corporation

Jeff successfully executed multiple projects for U. S. Steel Corporation, resulting in more than $16 million in savings. Jeff also led negotiations in four supplier summits, resulting in 15% savings on $13.5 million spend.

Andrew PaulsenSpaceX

Andrew has helped transform the castings commodity at SpaceX into a strategic organization focused on the

reduction of risk and the amplification of innovative designs and production processes.

Blake PryorChevron

Blake is currently leveraged as a negotiation expert for complex and high-value efforts across all SCM functions in the Angolan BU. Blake also co-developed and rolled out a systematic and repeatable approach to assess operationally how contracts are leveraged at Chevron. These evaluations led to successfully reducing costs by millions of dollars without negotiations and fed the next generation scope and commercial structure development for future contracts.

Bernadette QuiriconiFluke Corporation

Bernadette was appointed as the master scheduler of Fluke Corporation and, within two months in the position, she

eliminated delivery backlog, raised on-time delivery rates to 96% and reduced the expedited freight cost by more than 70%.

Sara RobichauxApache Corporation

Sara negotiated Apache Corporation’s first frac sand contracts, achieving savings of 25 to 40%. She also conducted and shared research of emerging proppant industry matters, which saved Apache tens of millions of dollars in 2015.

Michaela RomaniasDuPont

Through category management, Michaela developed and executed global buying strategies by establishing category

playbooks for two key raw material categories. During her time in the role she delivered over $3 million of year over year

savings. She also led an initiative to analyze DuPont's current accounts payable position and presented $10 million worth of

opportunities for improvement to business leadership.

Subhash SegireddyCisco Systems

Subhash led a team at Cisco to develop a strategy, from concept to execution, for a manufacturing project that enables resiliency in the supply chain while reducing greenhouse gas emissions and drives millions of dollars in cost savings with increased scale and a vertically aligned supply chain. This project has helped Subhash gain trust and respect across stakeholders, allowing him to lead high impact projects.

Ruchir SudFCA US LLC

Ruchir manages multiple carriers and service providers for FCA US LLC. He successfully leads his team in reducing outbound inefficiencies to the budget by 47%.

Jaime ToddAmerican Red Cross

Jaime created innovative projects for the Red Cross, including the first-ever toolkit for category managers, a supplier risk framework, and a supplier risk policy and procedure.

Tianhou ZhongCoach, Inc.

Tianhou has pioneered the development of specialized solutions to automate complex Sourcing tasks while reducing

overall team workload. Through the use of these solutions, Tianhou was able to drive over $30 million of savings across multiple organizations while reducing the time-to-savings by an average of 75%. These specialized solutions are capable

of auto-generating executive level reporting, which enables real-time sourcing metrics review.

Nominations for next year’s program opens this fall.