Events

Operations Summit: Supply Chain Risk Assessment and Opportunities to Scale

Session Description:

In an uncertain regulatory and geopolitical world, today’s manufacturing supply chain is a complicated, constantly changing landscape. In a world where supply chain disruptions from weather, pandemics, and geopolitics are creating chaos in supply chain management, what is the best course of action for manufacturers to address supply chain risk, or identify opportunities to leverage and seize so they can scale their business? In this Operations Summit we will have experts that bring thoughtful discussion and solutions, as well as useful tools that can be used to drive your manufacturing business forward.

EVENT DETAILS:

Texas State University - Round Rock Campus 1555 University Blvd, Round Rock, TX 78665

March 11, 2025 9:00am - 12:00pm

Agenda:

8:00am – 8:30am – Registration and breakfast

8:30am – 9:15am – Regulatory and Geopolitical Risk Mitigation – Chris Siepman

9:15am – 10:00am – How CPOs are Evaluating Supply Chain – Panel discussion led by Roman Belotserkovskiy. Panelists include former CPO for Walmart and Schneider Electric and former Director of Procurement at Caterpillar.

10:00am – 10:10am – Break

10:10am – 10:40am – Foreign Trade Zones – Ben Ramirez

10:40am - 11:10am – ITAR/IS/AS/CMMC – How to Address Alphabet Soup – Kristin Wheatley

11:10am – 12:00pm – Sustainment: Supply Management Tool – Bret Boyd

Speaker Bios:

Chris Siepman is the managing Director of Weller James. Chris advises business leaders on geopolitics, international strategy, tariffs, international policy, value chain risk mitigation, and related topics. He has over a decade of experience advising senior U.S. government and business leaders on a broad range of international trade issues. He previously served as Director of Trade Enforcement at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, where he was a subject matter expert and internal consultant to senior government executives on quantitative aspects of the U.S. - China trade war tariffs and exclusions. He also developed successful strategies for winning multi-billion-dollar trade disputes at the World Trade Organization, advised on negotiations between the U.S. and other countries, developed partnerships across the federal government, led multidisciplinary teams of experts, and managed various capacity-building projects for the Executive Office of the President. Before that, he led U.S. government investigations into unfair international trade practices at the U.S. Department of Commerce’s International Trade Administration.

Roman Belotserkovskiy is a Partner at McKinsey & Company, based in Austin. He co-leads McKinsey’s Electric Power & Natural Gas Practice where he leads the Electric Power & Natural Gas Procurement & Supply Chain Service Line globally. Roman advises clients across all operational functions on accelerated cost reduction programs, operations performance transformations and supply chain transformations. In his role as leader of McKinsey’s Procurement and Product Development Practice he focuses on next generation and digital procurement, global sourcing, performance contracting for capital projects and services across sectors.

Kristin Wheatley is a Manufacturing Improvement Consultant with Southwest research Institute. Her expertise is in plant and production management, with more than 25 years of experience as a goal oriented, performance driven operations management professional. She has a keen ability to translate “technical” to “people”, and is an exceptionally effective communicator, team builder and leader with the ability to build relationships. Her specialties include: Process Analysis, Team Development, Problem Resolution, Diverse Perspective, Analysis/Analytics, Employee Engagement, Production Efficiency, Technical Expertise, Safety, Process Improvement, Cost Reduction, Budget Accountability, ISO 9001, ISO 13485, AS9100D, IATF 16949, Lean Manufacturing, and Six Sigma.

Ben Ramirez is the Vice President and Executive Director for the Center for Global Trade. He works with organizations to identify specific business goals and implement strategies which match their objectives. His expertise is providing chief executives and their teams with the tools they need to achieve sustainable growth in a continually changing global marketplace.

Bret Boyd is a Technology entrepreneur with a background in software, hardware, and information products. A four-tour Iraq veteran, he served in the special operations community. He is the Co-Founder and CEO of Sustainment, a software platform that helps US-based manufacturers easily find and work with the critical suppliers they need to build and manage their supply chains. Sustainment’s vision is to reimagine American manufacturing as a hyperconnected, secure, and resilient network of local and regional suppliers who can more easily connect, interact, and do business with the industry and government customers that rely on them.