Oct. 15, 2007 – Indian ‘chiefs’ to include former H-D staff

Indian Motorcycle recently hired two industry veterans from Harley-Davidson to become part of the company’s growing executive team.
“We already have a great brand, but now we also need to have a great group of engineers as well,” said Stephen Julius, the chairman of Indian Motorcycles. “Bike companies are built on engineering first and foremost.”
The new hires include Chris Bernauer, the former motorcycle platform director for Harley-Davidson’s Sportster. Bernauer spent more than 11 years at Harley-Davidson before being named general manager of Indian.
“I’m excited about the challenges and opportunities ahead of us,” Bernauer said in a press release.
Before joining Harley-Davidson, he was a manufacturing specialist in Toyota Motor Manufacturing’s powertrain division.
Another former Harley-Davidson employee, Nick Glaja, will be Indian’s vice president of engineering. Glaja was most recently the principal engineer of powertrain technology at Harley-Davidson.
“I can say that being involved with the rebirth of Indian Motorcycles is the most exciting and challenging opportunity of my career,” Glaja said in a press release. “Everything that we are going to build (for Indian) in the future is going to grow from a sound engineering foundation, and my first goal is to be able to provide just that.”
Before working at Harley-Davidson, Glaja was the powertrain group manager at Victory Motorcycles.