‘Comfortable being uncomfortable’: Linamar’s path to billions in a tariff-heavy world

Jim Jarrell, CEO & president of Linamar, joins BNN Bloomberg to discuss the company's performance following latest earnings report.

“Grit” was the main theme for Linamar Corp. this year as it navigates an ever changing economic landscape while posting record growth, says CEO Jim Jarrell.

While facing rising U.S. tariffs and securing major acquisitions, the Guelph, Ont.-based auto parts manufacturer says it’s building its entire business model around being more agile than its competitors amidst chaos.

“To win in this environment, first you got to be comfortable being uncomfortable,” says Jarrell.

“It’s almost like a whitewater rafting issue versus a cruise, right?”

Linamar reported $2.94 billion sales in its first quarter, rising from $2.53 last year. Its net earnings reached $221.4 million, up from $177.7 million in the same period last year.

It reported over $10 billion in sales revenue in 2025, down around three per cent from the year before.

Reclassifying shipping codes

Jarrell says 90 per cent of its revenue this year has been tariff free, and the company is getting creative to avoid tariffs altogether.

In April, the U.S. tightened its Section 232 tariffs on steel, aluminum, and copper imposing a 50 per cent duty on raw metal production and 25 per cent on derivatives products based on their full customs value.

To get around this, Linamar is reclassifying shipping codes and looking at “low effort, easy to implement, no cost solutions”, says Jarrell.

“An example of that would be if we have a scissor lift, you take it across the border with a reduced value. You might do the software flashing. You might be doing the calibration there again to reduce that level,” says Jarrell.

“Because we’re not going to move plants.”

Another thing that helped the company boost its revenue is the acquisition of three creative ‘distressed assets’ says Jarrell, which included a US$300 million deal to buy Aludyne’s North American assets, a nearly $72 million deal to buy the Georg Fischer Leipzig iron casting facility, and the acquisition of the Winning BLW manufacturing plants in Germany adding $200 million to the company’s revenue.

“We were able to sort of bring the Linamar way into them,” says Jarell.

Beyond the acquisitions, Jarell says the quarter’s success came from launching new products in the automotive division and seeing great sales volumes from its Skyjack brand, which makes industrial lift.

Jarell says the company expects growth in the mobility segment to be driven by a focus on powertrain, driveline, and transmission systems rather than specific vehicle platforms.

“There’s a lot of focus on that, you know, at this point in time,” he says.

Need for CUSMA deal and farmer struggles

Jarell says Canada, the U.S. and Mexico need to reach trading deals as soon as possible because the business landscape is changing on a daily basis.

He says the U.S. is the company’s largest trading partner and it has plants in Mexico that are impacted by tariffs as well.

“Nobody really knows where this is going to go,” says Jarrell.

He says the company’s farming sector is struggling because the agricultural market is at a historic low, as farmers have the money to buy but lack the confidence to spend.

“Because inventories are high. Farmer income, input costs, and also a lot of those government incentives have been really slow to pay, mainly in the U.S,” says Jarrell.

Despite the slow recovery, he says there is significant pent-up demand and that Linamar’s farm brands are ready to ramp up production the moment the market turns around.