Tim Gargaro is currently the Chairman of North American Metals Corp, an automotive supplier in the Detroit area, and is President of Integrita, LLC, a financial and strategic advisory firm. Tim is best known as an accomplished CFO, with significant experience in Operations, Strategy, Mergers & Acquisitions and the Capital Markets. In thirty years as a CFO, Tim has served privately held and publicly traded firms as well as those held by private equity, ranging in size from $50 million to $17 Billion, managing as many as 350 reporting locations globally from every continent and time zone.
Tim played a significant role in the growth of Lear Corporation from $1 Billion to $17 Billion in a seven-year period. He ran the due diligence and post- acquisition integration of the Ford Seat Trim business in Mexico, the Fiat Seat Business in Italy & Poland and Keiper Car Seating in six countries which manufactured seats for Porsche, Mercedes and Audi, to name just a few. During his time at Lear, Tim also started the Corporate Audit Function with a dual relationship reporting to the CFO of Lear and a Board Member. Tim was promoted to serve as the CFO of Lear’s European operations, the CFO of the Chrysler Division, and the CFO of the Ford Division. Subsequently, he would hold CFO positions in public companies such as Delco Remy International, and Exide Technologies with public traded equity, and others with public debt. Tim has well over 40 capital market transactions to his credit where he has led an acquisition, a bank syndication, an equity offering, or a High Yield Bond Offering. Those deals and capital approximate $10 billion in value. He has presented to all the major Wall Street firms, investors and major banks on numerous occasions, having crisscrossed the US and done “road shows”, and has represented his public company as the head of Investor Relations in both a NYSE firm and a NASDAQ firm. Tim has also stepped into several “troubled firms”, where he has led these companies thru the bankruptcy process to exit and thru their post chapter 11 reorganization. He has lived in Europe on three different occasions, having lived in Italy, Germany and Belgium.
Outside of his professional duties, Tim has donated his time to health care as a Trustee, where Tim served for nine years as a Health Alliance Plan (“HAP”) Board Member, and additionally for five years serving as a Trustee Committee member for the Henry Ford Health System. He was a very active Board member serving on twelve different committees between HAP and the Health System and participated as one of a few select Trustees in the interview process for the Malcom Baldridge Award to the Health System. He was selected during the failed Henry Ford -Beaumont merger to vet the financial synergies of the combination. He has also served as a Judge for the CFO Awards for Crain’s Detroit Business since 2011. In 2003, Tim cofounded the CFO Council at the Original Equipment Suppliers Association (“OESA”). This council of CFO’s meet throughout the year and discuss issues that are relevant in the automotive supply industry. Tim was elected their first Chairman and established the ground rules which are being followed today in that very active body within the OESA.
Tim graduated in 1976 with a Bachelor of Science from UD Mercy, with a major in accounting, he obtained his MBA in the Advanced Management Program at MSU in 1984. He is a CPA in the State of Michigan, having begun his career at KPMG in the Detroit office. He is a graduate of the Six Sigma Institute from Scottsdale, AZ, and is a member of FEI-Detroit. He has served as a Judge for Crains Detroit Business CFO Awards since 2011, and currently serves as a member of the Board of Advisors to the School of Business Administration at UD Mercy. He lives in Bloomfield Hills with his wife Joan who holds an MBA from UD Mercy and a Masters in Public Health from University of Michigan. They have three grown children.