In our journey through the rigours of early-stage production, Savic Motorcycles has been able to draw on the exceptional expertise of Kel Kearns – widely regarded as one of Australia’s most informed and accomplished veterans of large-scale automotive manufacturing.

For more than three decades, Kel has been living and breathing vehicle production across four continents, including setting up factories making hundreds of thousands of vehicles in China, India and Thailand. He’s currently the CEO of Amplify Cell Technologies, a consortium formed by Daimler, Paccar and Accelera, which is developing lithium-iron-phosphate battery cells for Daimler and Isuzu trucks in Mississippi.

Prior to this appointment, Kel oversaw construction of the Tennessee Electric Vehicle Centre – a production hub for all-electric Ford trucks – after running a major JV building Ford and Mazda vehicles for 130 countries in eastern Thailand. Kel originally joined Ford in Broadmeadows, Melbourne, in 1994, and was one of the company’s longest-serving Australian employees.

Kel is also an unabashed motorsports fan, both as a spectator and a regular driver in his Ford Performance Mustang. In 2020, he took out the TAV8 Series Championship in the Thailand Super Series, and he’s currently competing in the inaugural 2024 Mustang Challenge Series across North America.