Bridgestone Europe has announced senior management appointments effective 1 January, 2012. Franco Annunziato, currently BSEU’s chief quality officer, senior vice president technology and board member, will become CEO and president of BSEU, succeeding Makio Ohashi.

Mitsuhira (Mike) Shimazaki, currently sales and marketing head will assume the newly created role of COO reporting to Annunziato. He will continue to head sales and marketing and assume additional responsibility for manufacturing and supply chain management.

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Annunziato will relocate from the Rome-based technical center to BSEU’s headquarters in Brussels.

Ohashi will return to Tokyo-based Bridgestone Corporation to head Asia Pacific, China, Middle East, Africa and Russia tyre operations.

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