Above-target EBIT, slight sales growth – Conti gives provisional figures for 2013
Continental’s newly-published provisional key figures for the 2013 fiscal year show the tyre and automotive component maker achieved an adjusted EBIT margin of 11.2 per cent, comfortably beating the target of at least 10.5 per cent set last November. Year-on-year sales increased slightly, rising from €32.7 billion to €33.3 billion.
Continue ReadingFrom now on, Pirelli is “for sale”
As reported yesterday, Pirelli CEO Marco Tronchetti Provera, whose family holds the largest single stake in the company, plans a full departure from the company, first as CEO and then as shareholder. The only point we can now speculate on is the timeframe this will occur within; Tronchetti says he plans to take this step in 2017.
Continue ReadingWas a rival Cooper bid the elephant in Apollo’s room?
As late as 15 November, Cooper Tire & Rubber wrote in a statement that it “continues to seek the expeditious closing of the merger with Apollo Tyres.” Yet Sunam Sarkar, chief financial officer at Apollo Tyres, opines that Cooper’s fidelity as a partner was in question from the very start – a point that only came to light later on.
Continue ReadingSupertracker STR210R wheel alignment system a ‘little brother’ to flagship STR420
Southampton based wheel alignment equipment specialist Supertracker has recently added a brand new product to its product portfolio, while continuing to provide a high standard of customer training. While the new, “bridge model” STR210R model was initially previewed at the Commercial Vehicle Show in April, its introduction came into the second half of 2013, and […]
Continue ReadingTronchetti Provera bids Pirelli adieu
To mark his upcoming 66th birthday on 18 January, Marco Tronchetti Provera granted German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung a long interview. During this he shared his intention to step down as Pirelli’s chief executive in the coming two years and subsequently sell the family’s 25.1 per cent share in the company. His three children are following their own paths and anyway it is difficult to inherit the role of business entrepreneur. Until last year, Tronchetti was also engaged in a showdown with the Genoa-based Malacalza industrial family. Tronchetti originally invited the Malacalza family to become investors, but later Tronchetti gained the impression they were trying to oust him. In the course of this struggle Francesco Gori, in charge of Pirelli’s tyre business, lost his job. He now serves as an advisor to Malacalza Investitmenti, which is currently the second-largest Pirelli shareholder but openly interested in expanding its involvement.
Continue ReadingCould new Hunter machine help increase breadth of servicing sales opportunities?
Maximising the revenue opportunities offered by services is a key part of any modern garage’s strategy. The reduced margins available on tyres – and the effective outsourcing of the tyre retail process to e-Commerce websites – mean that making the most of services such as wheel alignment and diagnostic checks has become increasingly important. Pro-Align, the distributor of Hunter wheel alignment equipment in the UK, has offered one complementary tool in the recent past to speed up the diagnosis of misaligned wheels, the Hunter Quick Check, but the most recent innovation is the Quick Check Lane – a modular diagnostic system that allows garages to add brake and battery performance checks, in addition to tyre pressure and tread depth measurements to the alignment diagnosis procedure. Tyrepress visited Pro-Align’s recently refurbished and reorganised unit near Towcester, Northamptonshire to see the new unit in action, while business managers Paul and Kathryn Beaurain explained the background to the latest wave of Hunter equipment innovations.
Continue ReadingPanAridus first to produce test quality guayule
Just after the summer of 2013 PanAridus reported that it had broke an industry milestone, becoming the first bio-agricultural company to produce sufficient quality and quantity of guayule rubber samples in-house for commercial testing and use.
Continue ReadingGoodyear to webcast from DB industry conference
A webcast of Goodyear Tire & Rubber’s business overview and strategies will be held on 14 January; the live audio webcast of executive vice-president and chief financial officer Laura Thompson’s 40 minute presentation at the 2014 Deutsche Bank Global Auto Industry Conference in Detroit, US can be viewed from the http://investor.goodyear.com and will be available 1:35pm local time (6:35pm GMT, 7:35pm CET) on 14 January.
Continue ReadingApollo share price hits all-time high
While shares in Cooper Tire & Rubber have begun 2014 at roughly the same price they traded for a year earlier after climbing as high as $34.79 and dipping to $20.55 in between, former prospective purchaser Apollo Tyres’ share price has risen to an all-time high following the breakup of negotiations between the two companies […]
Continue ReadingCar registrations break 2.2 million mark, return to pre-recession levels
Car registration figures for 2013 appear to show that consumer confidence is increasing, with 2,264,737 cars registered in 2013, up 10.8 per cent on 2012. This exceeds the SMMT’s 2.25 million forecast for the year and is the highest annual registration total since 2007. December was the 22nd consecutive monthly rise.
Continue ReadingWhat next for Cooper and Apollo?
While it is clear that each side is effectively blaming the other for the collapse of the deal, the actual cost of the defunct courtship ritual is somewhat more opaque. We know that Cooper’s lawyers will be defending the firm against claims for the $50 million it agreed in the business equivalent of a pre-nuptial agreement, but several newspapers report that Apollo has to fight off claims for a significantly bigger $112 million break-up fee. And of course none of this puts a price on the large sums of money spent out on corporate lawyers or even more importantly on lost time. So whats next for the two companies?
Continue ReadingSale of Carlisle Transportation Products completed
On 31 December, Carlisle Companies Incorporated announced it had completed the cash sale of Carlisle Transportation Products to American Industrial Partners; an enterprise value of US$375 million was paid for the tyre, wheel and transmission belt manufacturer.
Continue ReadingApollo launches UK, India ad campaign
Apollo Tyres has commenced a new corporate advertising campaign in the UK and India that draws on the company’s three-year agreement with Manchester United F.C. for these two markets. The campaign covers television, cinema, print, digital and outdoor mediums and focuses on the shared values of both football club and tyre maker, specifically ‘going the distance to achieve the best’.
Continue ReadingPirelli signs Armenia synthetic rubber MoU
On 27 December, Pirelli reported the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between Pirelli Tyre Russia, Russian petroleum company Rosneft and Oil Techno; the MoU covers setting up a joint venture to research and develop synthetic rubber, in particular Styrene-Butadiene Rubber (SBR), in Armenia.
Continue ReadingNokian to appeal tax bill
On 30 December, Nokian Tyres received the unwelcome news that a reassessment made by Finland’s Tax Administration has determined the company must pay €26.9 million in additional taxes, plus punitive tax increases and interest, for the year 2007. The full amount will be recorded in Nokian’s 2013 financial statement and results. The company says it will appeal the ruling, however should it be upheld Nokian’s corporate tax rate will rise over the next five years to the maximum rate of 22 per cent, rather than to the previously announced 17 per cent.
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