CEVA expands relationship with Ford Motor Company

Global third-party logistics (3PL) services provider CEVA Logistics said this week it has expanded its relationship with automotive bellwether Ford Motor Company. CEVA and Ford have had a business relationship for more than 20 years.

CEVA said it will provide inbound transportation logistics services for Ford’s Coldwater, Michigan-based Coldwater Origin Distribution Center (ODC), adding that its transportation operations will be based in various Michigan locations and provide pickup and delivery to the Coldwater ODC.

“It’s a tremendous privilege for CEVA to help support the expansion of this new Ford facility.  We are proud and excited to receive this award of business from one of our largest global customers,” said Kerry Zielinski, CEVA’s Vice President of Business Development and Ford account lead for the Americas, in a statement. “Our customer’s growth in the Automotive industry has fueled our company’s expansion and market leadership in the Automotive sector as well.”

A CEVA spokesman told LM that this business award was first part of a study to determine if this supply chain change improved the existing network.

“Any change in a supply chain variable like this involves routing changes, mode changes and of course the flow of material to plants,” the spokesman said. “We were selected to bid to support this new ODC in early 2014.”

The inbound transportation services being provided by CEVA at Ford’s Coldwater ODC include truckload and milk runs. The spokesman declined to disclose how many CEVA employees will work out of this facility as a matter of company policy.

Last September, CEVA renewed its contract and expanded its business with Ford.

CEVA has served Ford’s Kansas City Assembly Plant (KCAP) for more than 11 years, and with a new contract in place it will continue to provide the automotive manufacturer with various logistics-related functions at the Claycomo, Missouri-based KCAP, including sequencing of inbound materials, small lot logistics, return container management and just in time transportation to and from the plant.

The KCAP manufactures the F-Series truck and will be the future home of the Ford Transit, according to CEVA officials. They also noted that the Kansas City operation is CEVA’s longest running automotive manufacturing support operation for Ford in the Americas.

The automotive sector continues to make strides as an integral part of the slow-paced economic recovery as evidenced by increasing new automotive sales and on the manufacturing front, too.

Earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. auto sales rose 11 percent in May, with industry sales hitting1.6 million vehicles and the seasonally adjusted annualized selling rate coming in at 16.77 million cars and light trucks, according to data from market researcher Autodata Corp.