Tremec-trification

Tremec cranks up electric-drive innovation as the logical extension of its transmission-making expertise.

Tremec is charting a future in vehicle electrification that leverages the company's gear-manufacturing history while clearly departing from its intrinsic connection to internal combustion engine. Tremec, a transmission developer and manufacturer, was created in 1964 to build transmissions in Mexico for Ford, GM and then-Chrysler. Like many longstanding auto-sector suppliers, Tremec is now remaking itself to be successful in the inevitable EV transition, and the company is shaping that transformation with a strategy that reflects its unique market presence.

Industry insiders and performance enthusiasts know Tremec by its decades-long reputation in manual-transmission development and, most recently, as the supplier of the brilliant automated-manual transmissions that flavor the high-performance character of the current eighth-generation Chevrolet Corvette and the thundering Ford Mustang Shelby GT500, among other high-profile applications. The company produces about 300,000 light-vehicle transmissions and upwards of 80,000 commercial-vehicles transmissions a year, said Matt Memmer, Tremec's director, engineering and program management, in an interview with SAE Media in the first half of 2023. Memmer emphasized how Tremec's internal combustion-related transmission expertise is fueling its expansion into electric propulsion.