Toyota Financial Services’ expanded staff roles aim to spur global growth

Toyota Financial Services has expanded the global roles for both Mike Groff, its president and CEO (pictured above), and Chris Ballinger, its senior vice president and CFO.

Groff’s role as president and CEO of Toyota Financial Services (TFS) in the US has expanded to include operations in Canada, Puerto Rico, Mexico, Brazil, Venezuela and Argentina, the company revealed in the statement.

Groff, 60, has been CEO of TFS in the US since 2013. Last year he initiated plans for the finance arm to move to Plano, Texas, near Toyota’s new North American headquarters. Toyota Motor Corp. announced the move to Plano in April 2014, and construction of the Plano campus is expected to be completed by early 2017.

Engineering and product-development operations will be consolidated at the Toyota Technical Center near Ann Arbor, Mich.

Toyota Motor Credit Corp (as it was then) hired Groff as its seventh employee, an operations administrator, in 1983. Since then, he’s climbed the ladder. He has worked as a Toyota Financial branch manager and regional manager. He has also been corporate marketing and leasing manager, vice president of corporate strategy, vice president of customer service and senior vice president of sales, marketing and product development.

Ballinger, senior vice president and CFO for TFS’ US operations (pictured below), will also assume an expanded role. He was appointed the chief officer of management of innovation, which means he will guide Toyota Financial’s global strategy to focus on future market trends and business model requirements.

Ballinger, 58, has been vice president since 2006 and CFO since 2008. He joined Toyota Financial in 2003 as vice president of treasury.

The changes were effective July 1, the company said in a statement last Thursday.