Adient Dismisses Two Senior Executives

Adient plc, formerly the automotive seating and interiors business of Johnson Controls Inc., has removed two top executives who headed its engineering, manufacturing, quality, supply chain, innovation and marketing operations.

The two ousted executives are Byron Foster, who led the company’s engineering, production, quality procurement and supply chain operations; and Brian Grady, who headed innovation, specialty seating, marketing and global customers. Both men had been longtime executives at JCI.

The dismissals, which took effect on March 1, are seen as the beginning of a management shakeup at the Plymouth, Mich.-based company, Automotive News reports.

The overhaul is being led by CEO Doug Del Grosso, who was hired as CEO of the struggling company in October. He vowed last month to improve the company’s financial performance after Adient posted a 47% drop to $54 million in quarterly pretax earnings.