Sean Suggs, president of Toyota Motor Manufacturing Mississippi, will address Mississippi Valley State University’s 2018 graduating class during the university’s 66th commencement exercises on Saturday.
Due to a prediction of showers and thunderstorms, the university announced today that the ceremonies, originally to be held at Rice-Totten Stadium, will be moved indoors to the R.W. Harrison Sports Complex.
Degrees will be presented in two separate sessions, one at 8 a.m. and one at 11 a.m. Complete details on which departmental degrees will be handed out at which ceremony can be found at www.mvsu.edu.
Suggs will speak at both ceremonies.
Suggs heads one of Mississippi’s most successful manufacturing operations, the Toyota plant at Blue Springs that produces the Corolla — Toyota’s highest volume-selling vehicle in the world.
Toyota announced last week that it will invest $170 million and add 400 jobs at the Blue Springs facility as it prepares to build the next-generation Corolla hatchback.
Suggs was named president in January and also serves as vice president of administration. He served as vice president of manufacturing from 2016 to 2017 and was vice president of administration from 2014 to 2016 at the vehicle assembly plant.
A graduate of Oakland City College in Oakland City, Indiana, in 2000, Suggs earned his Master of Business Administration degree from Auburn University in 2010. He joined Toyota in 2014.
Prior to joining Toyota, he served as director of strategy, administration and human resources from 2011 to 2013 at Nissan’s North American headquarters in Franklin, Tennessee. At Nissan, he also directed production quality at the company’s manufacturing plant in Canton.
Suggs is a member of the state Board of Education. He also serves on the Mississippi Economic Council’s executive committee and is a board member of the Mississippi Manufacturers Association.
•Contact Kathryn Eastburn at 581-7235 or keastburn@gwcommonwealth.com.
