Del West Engineering, the leading designer and manufacturer of lightweight valve train components for racing and limited production passenger cars and motorcycles, has named Olivier Conne managing director of the company's Roche, Switzerland facility. The Roche plant provides design services and parts manufacturing for valve train hardware other than the valve itself, augmenting the product line produced by Del West USA. 

Conne brings broad-based experience and a wide range of skills and talents to Del West's European operations. He received a masters in engineering from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, and completed post-graduate courses in personnel management, finance and marketing. Fluent in four languages, he is also a private pilot. 

Conne spent seven years with the respected and diverse Nestle firm, headquartered in Very, Switzerland. With Nestle, he worked in operations improvement, sourcing, market analysis, strategy definition, sales, and manufacturing management. He also has a background in product engineering. Conne served an internship at Del West in the late 1990s, working on the development of the first commercially available pneumatic valve actuation system. 

In his new role, Conne will report to Al Sommer, Del West Engineering's chief executive officer.