In late 1979, Firestone brought in John Nevin as president. He was the former head of Zenith Electronics. Firestone was more than a billion dollars in debt at the time, and losing 250 million dollars a year. Nevin closed nine of the company's seventeen manufacturing plants. He moved the company from Akron to Chicago. He split the non-tire related businesses from the main company. In 1988 Nevin negotiated the sale of the company to the Japanese company Bridgestone. Bridgestone Corporation Japan was able to buy the company for much less than it had been worth a decade and a half earlier. The combined Bridgestone Firestone North American operations are now based in Nashville, Tennessee.