Kent Rice

Kent Rice is group vice president of the Quality Division for Toyota Motor North America (TMNA) in Plano, Texas, where he is responsible for the development, deployment and management of the quality systems and policies within Toyota’s North American operations.

His previous assignment was as vice president of quality at Toyota Engineering and Manufacturing of America (TEMA) in Erlanger, Kentucky, where he had similar responsibilities.

Rice’s prior experience includes positions as North American shop self-reliance lead for quality as well as the quality control general manager of Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada (TMMC). While at TMMC, he also held positions as assistant general manager of Lexus assembly and was the quality manager responsible for the preparation of the first Lexus built outside of Japan. Rice joined Toyota in 1991 working as a quality engineer specializing in chassis and powertrain systems at TMMC.

Rice earned a Bachelor of Applied Science in mechanical engineering from the University of Waterloo and is a licensed Professional Engineer in the Province of Ontario, Canada.