Leonel Leal is Director, Global Advanced Manufacturing Engineering at Whirlpool. At Whirlpool, Leonel leads the global strategy for Industrial digital transformation to enable the next level of production capabilities, advanced process technology, along with global application of concurrent engineering methodology. At Whirlpool, Leonel’s team executes manufacturing system design and global manufacturing architecture to deliver winning products for our customers. Through industrial digital transformation Whirlpool’s Advanced Manufacturing team has been able to establish foundational technology capability, build production intelligence, and advance to deliver products for a digital world. Leonel’s leadership in concurrent engineering has allowed our product and manufacturing teams to collaborate and introduce breakthrough connected products, at reduced cost, with radical lead-time reduction.
Prior to Whirlpool, Leonel worked extensively in automotive, new mobility and electric vehicle startups implementing hyper-speed manufacturing lead times and digital product design. Through stints at Tesla and FaradayFuture, Leonel created the methodology, advanced process, and concurrent design to develop the Tesla Model-S and FF91 from initial concept through production-ready execution. Leonel began his career at Toyota developing a foundation in Lean manufacturing, design thinking methodology, and operational excellence. Leonel has a B.S. in Engineering;Product Design from Stanford University