A supplier-mapping tool built for due diligence is now driving tariff mitigation, chip-risk management and logistics savings, says Nissan's Gerardo de la Torre

Joining Automotive Logistics on the Red Sofa at the Digital Strategies 2026 event in Nashville, Gerardo de la Torre, Nissan's regional senior director of supply chain management for the Americas, described how a database originally built for compliance has quietly become one of the company's most versatile strategic assets.

The Tier-N supplier database, launched around two years ago, was conceived to meet human-rights and supply chain due-diligence obligations. Working under confidentiality agreements with its tier-one suppliers, Nissan has now mapped more than 95% of its total commodities across the Americas and into Asia. That visibility, de la Torre says, is paying back in ways the team never planned for – and feeding directly into the revenue-resilience agenda it is pursuing under the Re:Nissan recovery plan.

The clearest dividend is tariff mitigation. By tracing US-origin content down through tier-two, tier-three and beyond, Nissan can document the American value embedded in parts shipped from suppliers in Mexico – evidence it is using to pursue exemption thresholds with authorities. "If there is a need for an audit or a validation of numbers, everything is digitally available," he said.

The same mapping is reshaping how Nissan manages semiconductor risk. Amid a renewed shortage of DRAM memory, the data pinpoints specific chipmakers, locations and part numbers, letting the team react far faster than it could during the 2021 chip crisis.

Resilience is the connecting thread. When a tier-three supplier was hit by a cyber attack, the mapping helped Nissan and its tier-one partners trace the affected network and source alternatives before the disruption spread.

Logistics is next. De la Torre wants to link Nissan's transport management systems directly with those of suppliers to consolidate freight on shared lanes. "What if we connect our TMS system with yours… what if we merge?" he asked, framing it as an untapped cost-reduction opportunity.

The wider signal for the industry is that compliance infrastructure, often treated as a cost centre, can double as a platform for resilience and savings. "I'm more and more convinced the Tier-N sourcing database is giving us new capabilities," he said.

De la Torre shares the full story on the Red Sofa – click play to watch.

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