Tenneco Powertrain Nabs 2 PACE Innovation Awards

The winners of this year’s PACE Awards (Premier Automotive Suppliers’ Contribution to Excellence) for innovation consisted of 13 suppliers from around the world.

Tenneco Powertrain, which was created earlier this year as a spinoff from the merged operations of Tenneco Inc. and Federal-Mogul Corp., was the only supplier to receive two awards. One was for an aluminum alloy used in manufacturing diesel pistons; the other was for a software tool that predicts powertrain behavior in the development of piston rings.

The annual honors, which are sponsored by Automotive News and Canada’s Automotive Parts Manufacturers’ Assn., are chosen by a panel of independent judges based on product innovation and market impact.

The winners were selected from a group of 35 finalists representing 31 companies and announced in conjunction with the start of SAE International’s WCX engineering show in Detroit.

The full list of honorees and their innovations are:

• Aptiv: Automated driving satellite compute platform
• BorgWarner: Dual-volute turbocharger for gasoline engines
• Caresoft: Computed tomography vehicle benchmarking system
• Dana: AdvanTEK axle system
• Exco Engineering: 3D printed die components
• Faurecia: Resonance free pipe
• Tenneco Powertrain: Aluminum alloy for diesel pistons
• Tenneco Powertrain: 3D piston ring software development tool
• Gentherm: Thermoelectric battery thermal management
• Lear: Adaptive rear seating rail system
• Material Sciences: Smart steel
• Stratec: Power tailgate system
• Tula Technology: Dynamic Skip Fire technology
• Velodyne: Alpha Puck lidar

In addition, three carmakers won Innovation Partnership awards. GM was honored twice for its separate partnerships with Tula (Dynamic Skip Fire) and Ushr (high-definition maps).

Audi teamed with Aptiv on the development of the supplier’s automated driving satellite platform. Chinese EV startup Nio partnered with Flex on the development of a reconfigurable interior.