President of Manufacturing & Services, Flex
Search every verified Paul Baldassari interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Paul Baldassari, President of Manufacturing & Services at Flex, has discussed the company's sustainability targets and workforce initiatives. In a 2025 appearance, he stated that Flex announced a sustainability target in 2022 aligned with the UN Global Compact and Sustainable Development Goals, including a commitment to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2040. He described the company's approach as involving both internal factory operations and supply chain partners, and emphasized the role of Flex's 140,000 employees, noting that the company provides 40 hours of learning per year per person to support decision-making that benefits Flex, its customers, and the environment. In earlier appearances, Baldassari discussed Flex's response to the COVID-19 pandemic. He said the company pivoted to produce ventilators and masks, distributing 12 mask manufacturing lines across 10 factories and producing over 80 million masks. He attributed the rapid response to teamwork and breaking down barriers, noting that a typical 12-to-24-month product development cycle was reduced to six weeks. Baldassari has also commented on automation and the future of work, stating that automation will drive quality for customers and create more interesting jobs, and that the future of work will focus more on technology and innovation.
“We committed to be net zero on greenhouse gas emissions by 2040, and that requires us to work within our four walls of our factories as well with all of our supply chain partners.”
“Our top goals are to make sure that we harness the power of our 140,000 people worldwide and take all their initiative and energy around sustainability to make the world a little bit better every day.”
“It's key that you have clear targets, and we've announced in 2022 our sustainability target in line with the global compact and the sustainable development goals.”
“The real differentiator for us are our people, making sure that everybody's idea every day resides in an improvement in our sustainability journey.”
“If I have a magic wand, it's making sure that everybody has the competencies. We provide 40 hours of learning every year for our people and the technology that they can make these decisions that drive a win-win for Flex, for our customers and for the environment every day.”
“Flex, we want to be the manufacturing partner of choice. We want to design and manufacture products for our customers that improve the world.”
“He told me and taught me that it's really all about the people. Customers are not choosing us because we have the best line or because we have the best factory — they actually choose us because we have the best team.”
“Once you get into a pandemic where it's even more important that you get product fast out to the patients that need it, we were able to get with our customers and with regulatory environment and authorities to break down those barriers and speed up not only the design piece but also the supply chain.”
“We put all of our brains together, and we basically used every, single piece of capacity that we had to provide components that we could use for ventilators.”
“We distributed 12 mask manufacturing lines in 10 factories around the world and have produced over 80 million masks; we did not have a shortage at all in the company about face masks for our people.”
“My biggest takeaway is when we think out of the box, we can make the impossible happen; that 12 to 24 months on a product development cycle in normal times boiled down to six weeks because everybody was working together under huge pressure.”
“The resilient supply chain is a result of real-time digitization of supply chain; our system today provides us real-time supply chain information so we can see where all the different parts in the world are and which suppliers may be impacted.”
“Automation is key for us because we want to be able to manufacture even if our people cannot come to the factory; we want to provide an environment that people can work remote and still produce high-quality products on the shop floor.”
“The future of work will be much more focused on technology and innovation; the job content will be more in research and development.”
“Automation will take away some jobs, but in reality, it will continue to drive quality for our customers, creating a win-win situation with interesting jobs.”
Paul Baldassari, Flex, shares how Flex is addressing sustainability challenges in electronics manufacturing by working toward a ...
Paul Baldassari of Flex Manufacturing joins the Executive Series to share how their company pivoted abruptly in response to ...
What skills must employees have in the future? Paul Baldassari, Executive Vice President Strategic Programs and Asset ...
Sign in to search the full transcript archive, filter by topic, and access every quote from Paul Baldassari.
The summary and quote tags on this profile are produced with AI assistance from verified, first-person interview transcripts, then checked by our team to confirm the speaker's identity and the accuracy of every quote. See how we verify →