It is nothing new that original equipment manufacturers are dictating to their supply chain what materials to use and how to use them that will eventually go into their products.
Moreso, this is nothing new in the automotive industry, where OEMs have made it standard practice to specify how the parts they plan to buy will be produced. It is their money they are spending, so they can call the shots.
Sometimes it has to do with the economics of the process, sometimes the geopolitical situation, and sometimes it is for appearances before the public.
Either way, the automotive industry is again flexing its muscles, as you will read about in our cover story on how a Michigan electroplating company spent close to $4 million to revamp its hexavalent chromium line to add trivalent tanks because, well, that is what General Motors wanted them to do.
“This was the right choice for Lapeer,” says Doug Goad, CEO of Lapeer Plating & Plastic. “The reality is GM is our largest customer, and so when your largest customer makes a change — or a mandate — that impacts you, then certainly you have to discuss as a business unit and make a business decision. And knowing that at the OEM level, this is the migration from hex to tri, and it is only going to continue.”
Some of this, I'm sure, comes from the disaster that occurred at Tribar Technologies several years ago, when hex chrome was leaked into waterways and fingers were pointed at some of their automotive industry customers.
But it isn't just finishing operations that are seeing changes in how OEMs dictate when and how their parts are manufactured.
Attorney Bob Brewer with the Braumiller Law Group says in a newsletter update to their clients that GM instructed thousands of its suppliers to phase out sourcing parts and materials from China by 2027. The exit strategy began in early 2024, with the directive gaining momentum in the spring of 2025.
"This directive is part of GM’s broader strategy to enhance supply chain resiliency and reduce exposure to geopolitical risks, particularly amid escalating, or let’s just say, continuously fluctuating, U.S.–China trade tensions," Brewer says.
The company is encouraging suppliers to find alternative sources, Brewer says, preferably within North America, though it remains open to non-Chinese international suppliers that meet regulatory and logistical standards.
For those who are at the mercy of the automotive sector, which may be a huge portion of your customer base, the next few years may see more of these edicts from OEMs looking to shore up their supplier lines and avoid any embarrassment like what happened at Tribar.
“Eventually, I think what we're going to see is this progression away from hex chrome to tri chrome,” says Mike Hitch, Commercial Director for LPP. “It started with GM, then Toyota followed, and Ford is moving in the same direction. All the North American OEMs are starting to fall one by one to trivalent chrome.”
Many who have been in the industry for decades say this is nothing new, of course. It was worse in the 1970s and 1980s, and even in the 1990s, they claim.
Still, with plating lines running at a multi-million-dollar price point, it is a hard pill to swallow sometimes when the checks shop owners write may only allow them to keep their existing customers and not add any more income to their bottom line. That pill is a heavy dose of reality medicine.
Tim Pennington is Editor-in-Chief of Finishing and Coating, and has covered the industry since 2010. He has traveled extensively throughout North America visiting shops and production facilities, and meeting those who work in the industry. Tim began his career in the newspaper industry, then wound itself between the sports field with the PGA Tour and marketing and communications firms, and finally back into the publishing world in the finishing and coating sector. If you want to reach Tim, just go 
