Prominent Auto Manufacturer Uses Altana to Trace and Identify China Dependencies
The challenge
A large, Tier 1 global automotive components manufacturer is a supplier for major OEMs. To comply with U.S. regulations, the manufacturer must avoid any upstream product exposure to materials, parts, and inputs that are sourced from more than 25 prohibited countries, including China. That manufacturer’s own direct supplier formally pledged that none of their raw materials originated from any of these restricted countries. But with potential exposure obscured far upstream in product value chains, it was not possible to verify this claim through traditional auditing or SCRM tools.
Why Traditional SCRM Tools Can't Fully Trace and Remediate Issues
The manufacturer’s procurement team used Altana AI to trace their product value chains far upstream, into their supplier’s upstream sourcing network. The traceability work revealed that the supplier was — contrary to their pledge — importing materials from a facility in China. This directly contradicted the official compliance declaration the manufacturer received, threatening the ability to do business in the U.S.
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"We used Altana to perform traceability and found our supplier misrepresented their sourcing from China. When we brought it to the table, they admitted it immediately — no other supply chain or procurement tool had ever gotten us to ground truth before."
The outcome
The manufacturer approached their supplier with the product value chains that Altana AI had produced and which indicated restricted country exposure. The supplier immediately admitted to intentional misrepresentation. The supplier said it concealed the China exposure to avoid disruption to its own product redevelopment and sourcing.
The auto manufacturer quickly disclosed the situation to the major OEM it supplies. The OEM has impressed the importance of product-line resilience and compliance to its suppliers, and is worried about unrealized sub-tier exposure to China and Taiwan.
The manufacturer told the OEM the cost of changing production lines to fully avoid Chinese exposure in product value chains. The OEM is now aware of the systemic nature of the issue and the supplier is using Altana to find new, compliant, cost-effective suppliers for vital product lines.
