AKRON, Ohio, Dec. 19, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company (NYSE: GT) today announced several key leadership succession moves designed to continue the positive momentum in the company's North American Tire business.

John F. "Jack" Winterton has been appointed president of the company's North American Tire consumer business unit.  He succeeds Steve McClellan, who was promoted to president of Goodyear North American Tire in August 2011.  At the same time, Phillip Kane has been appointed vice president of Goodyear's North American Tire commercial tire business, succeeding Joe Copeland, who has announced he will leave the company.

"I am very pleased that Jack will lead our North American consumer business," said McClellan.  "Nobody can match his combination of Goodyear experience, industry knowledge and customer perspective.  As one of the architects of our North American consumer business strategy, he will drive execution within our brand-focused, market-back approach and map our plan for the future.  Jack is absolutely the right person to lead us in 2012 and beyond."

Winterton, 58, has worked in Goodyear's North American Tire business for his entire career.  Most recently, he served as chief customer officer for Goodyear's North American Tire consumer business, a role he held beginning in December 2008.  Immediately prior to that, he was vice president of consumer tire sales (2003-2008) and director of dealer sales, consumer tires (2002-2003). Since 2002, Winterton has helped develop and execute the strategic direction for Goodyear's North American Tire consumer business, which shifted its focus to producing and selling innovative, high-value branded products in targeted market segments.

For the past year, Kane, 47, has been president of Wingfoot Commercial Tire Systems, Goodyear's nationwide network of on-highway commercial tire sales, service, and retread facilities.  Kane has spent his entire career in businesses related to the automotive and trucking industries.  He joined Goodyear in 2004 as director of strategic initiatives before moving to director of North American Tire's consumer wholesale distribution channel.  He was promoted to senior director, channel sales in December 2008 before moving to his most recent role leading the Wingfoot operation.

"Phillip has built outstanding relationships with our commercial truck tire customers, and I look forward to him taking our industry-leading fleet business solutions model to new levels of performance.  Both Phillip and Jack are driven by Goodyear's strategic objective of creating sustainable economic value." 

In addition, the company announced that Ryan Patterson succeeds Winterton in the newly created position of vice president, consumer operations and customer development. 

Patterson, 38, has been finance director for Goodyear's North American Tire consumer business since September, 2008.  While in that role, he expanded his scope of responsibilities, aligning business performance goals and measures with operations, production, marketing, and sales.  Prior to joining the North American team, Patterson worked in finance roles of increasing responsibility in the company's Latin American Tire business.

"Ryan's knowledge of our operations and his value in all areas across the consumer business will help our customers continue to grow in alignment with our North American strategy and objectives," said McClellan.           

Paul Wanstreet has been named to replace Kane as president of Wingfoot. Wanstreet, 54, returns to a leadership role at Wingfoot, where he previously served as vice president of operations for two years through 2009.  Most recently, he has been head of operations for Goodyear's consumer retail business.

"Paul has leadership experience at Wingfoot and has been building his business skills while working in our consumer retail operation.  I have full confidence that Wingfoot will continue to perform very well under Paul's guidance."

McClellan expressed thanks to Copeland for his leadership during his tenure in North American Tire.  "Joe made important contributions to several businesses at Goodyear, providing leadership in the face of some significant challenges.  We thank him for his contributions and wish him success in the future."

All new assignments are effective immediately.

Goodyear is one of the world's largest tire companies.  It employs approximately 73,000 people and manufactures its products in 54 facilities in 22 countries around the world.  Its two Innovation Centers in Akron, Ohio and Colmar-Berg, Luxembourg strive to develop state-of-the-art products and services that set the technology and performance standard for the industry.  For more information about Goodyear and its products, go to www.goodyear.com.

Certain information contained in this press release may constitute forward-looking statements for purposes of the safe harbor provisions of The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. There are a variety of factors, many of which are beyond our control, that affect our operations, performance, business strategy and results and could cause our actual results and experience to differ materially from the assumptions, expectations and objectives expressed in any forward-looking statements. These factors include, but are not limited to:  our ability to realize anticipated savings and operational benefits from our cost reduction initiatives or to implement successfully other strategic initiatives; increases in the prices paid for raw materials and energy; pension plan funding obligations; actions and initiatives taken by both current and potential competitors; deteriorating economic conditions or an inability to access capital markets; work stoppages, financial difficulties or supply disruptions at our suppliers or customers; the adequacy of our capital expenditures; a labor strike, work stoppage or other similar event; our failure to comply with a material covenant in our debt obligations; potential adverse consequences of litigation involving the company; as well as the effects of more general factors such as changes in general market, economic or political conditions or in legislation, regulation or public policy. Additional factors are discussed in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including our annual report on Form 10-K, quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and current reports on Form 8-K. In addition, any forward-looking statements represent our estimates only as of today and should not be relied upon as representing our estimates as of any subsequent date. While we may elect to update forward-looking statements at some point in the future, we specifically disclaim any obligation to do so, even if our estimates change.

SOURCE The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company