For the second year in a row, Sensata Bulgaria has been honored with the Team of the Year award at the Operational Excellence Awards, hosted by Lean Institute Bulgaria.
During the Tomorrow Redefined conference, Sensata showcased its strategic approach to maximizing customer value while minimizing waste. This recognition highlights the company’s holistic application of Lean methodology—integrated into both its manufacturing operations and team management practices.
Tommy Ver Elst, General Manager at Sensata, participated in a panel discussion titled “Why Lean Culture Is Crucial for Sustainable Growth in Dynamic Conditions.” He emphasized the company’s decade-long journey of continuous improvement, noting the successful implementation of smart automation, including robots, cobots, and AI-driven systems. These innovations have significantly boosted productivity, enhanced quality control, and supported employee development.
Sensata’s Lean practices span its manufacturing and engineering teams across Bulgaria, fostering a culture of daily engagement and empowering employees to contribute to ongoing process improvements.
Reflecting on the award, Ver Elst said: ““It is very special to pick up this award for a second consecutive year and particularly with the strong competition from other Bulgarian companies. In Bulgaria, our team is based across three sites, and we work hard to create a ‘one team’ approach where everyone’s ideas are valued and improvements and success are shared. The Lean methodology is a way of thinking, so it can be applied in different work processes, but also in our lives and in the way we treat people and teams in general. This award is the culmination of that work.”
About Sensata Technologies
Sensata Technologies is a global industrial technology company striving to create a safer, cleaner, more efficient and electrified world. Through its broad portfolio of mission-critical sensors, electrical protection components and sensor-rich solutions, Sensata helps its customers address increasingly complex engineering and operating performance requirements. With more than 18,000 employees and global operations in 14 countries, Sensata serves customers in the automotive, heavy vehicle & off-road, industrial, and aerospace markets. Learn more at www.sensata.com and follow Sensata on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and X.
About Lean
Lean is a way of thinking about creating needed value with less waste, and a practice consisting of continuous experimentation to achieve perfect value with zero waste. Through ongoing experimentation and feedback from employees at all levels, workers and managers learn by innovating in their work for increasingly better quality and flow, less time and effort, and lower cost. An organization characterized by lean practice is highly adaptive to its ever-changing environment when compared to its peers because of the systematic and continuous learning engendered by lean thinking and practice.