Sailun Tire Americas is planning to open a US technical centre in Chattanooga, Tennessee, USA that will develop tyres for passenger, light truck, SUV, CUV and medium truck tyres applications as well as tyres for electric vehicles. Tyre developed there will ultimately end up at both OE and replacement destinations.
On 24 June 2022 Sailun decided to invest 15.18 billion yuan in building a new tyre factory in Dongjiakou, West Coast New District, Qingdao City, Shandong Province. The planned annual production capacity is 20 million sets of semi-steel radial tyres, 10 million sets of all-steel radial tyres and 150,000 tons of OTR tyres. At present, the Sailun board of directors has passed this investment proposal.
In October, Yokohama announced that the company had appointed ex-Pirelli and ex-Prometeon executive Gregorio Borgo as its European president. Roughly nine months later, there are a number of indications that the European business is entering a new chapter, which includes plans to invest in the construction of a factory “in the heart of Europe”.
Triangle Tire has scrapped its plans to a build roughly half-a-billion dollar tyre factory in North Carolina, USA. According to the company, the project which had been strongly supported by local government officials in North Carolina was ended amicably with mutual consent.
Apollo Tyres is investing £5 million in a London-based digital innovation hub as part of a five-year growth plan, which involves significant investment in technology and cloud infrastructure. The announcement is set against the backdrop of UK prime minister Boris Johnson’s visit to India to discuss UK-India economic partnership, with Johnson specifically commenting on Apollo’s investment.
Nokian Tyres is expediting “plans to invest in new production capacity in Europe” in response to the sanctions against Russia, where the company has significant levels of tyre production. Specifically, Nokian’s board of directors will cut the dividend payable to shareholders by 106 million euros to fund the new capacity. Nokian Tyres will also increase capacity at its factories in Finland and the US with a view to becoming more geographically diversified in its manufacturing operations.
Bridgestone Americas has made a minority investment in May Mobility, marking the company’s first investment in public-serving autonomous vehicles (AVs). The new partnership paves the way for the future integration of Bridgestone’s digital and predictive tyre-centric technologies into May Mobility autonomous vehicles. The partnership will also provide Bridgestone with insights into autonomous vehicle operations that improve its core tyre products and mobility solutions.
Pirelli has stopped investment in the Russian market. At the same time, Pirelli is phasing down production at its two Russian tyre plants – Kirov and Voronezh. Writing in a statement published on 18 March 2022, executives confirmed that they have stopped investment in Russia “excluding those linked to security”. At the same time, Pirelli executives said: “activities of the factories in Russia will be progressively limited to those needed to guarantee the financing of salaries and social services for employees.”
Bridgestone Americas has become a minority shareholder in tyre sensor and data management company Tyrata, Inc. It says this partnership will “enable Bridgestone to offer more sustainable, efficient and cost-effective tyre management practices for fleets, including last- and middle-mile delivery fleets.”
Wheel manufacturer Iochpe-Maxion is investing US$5.5 million in Autotech Ventures LLC, a US-based venture capital firm. With this investment, Maxion joins Autotech Fund III as a Limited Partner. The investment aims to foster the development of new start-ups and research in the automotive segment with a focus on connectivity, autonomous vehicles, shared vehicles, electrification, and digitalisation.
Shandong Haohua Tire has broken ground on its previously-announced Sri Lanka tyre production base. Senior managers report that the US$300 million-dollar project’s workshop will be ready in mid-2022 and that the plant will go into production in late 2022.
Last month, this column suggested that “acquisitions, consolidation and sustainability” were three words that will sum-up developments in the tyre business in 2022. Judging by what has taken place in the weeks since that text was published, the overall argument was pretty sound. However, in retrospect it also seems pretty clear that we could have, and perhaps should have, added in a fourth term – “expansion”.
On 11 January 2021 Jiangsu Province Department of Commerce approved Jiangsu General Science Technology Co. Ltd’s (GS Tire) US$300 million investment in a new tyre factory in Cambodia. Company stock market filings had previously described that factory as a $204 million investment, which suggests the scope of the project has increased significantly.
During January 2021, Jiangsu Seyoun Tire Co. Ltd.’s phase 2 Suqian City, China factory construction project got underway. According to industry association CRIA, the new tyre production base is expected to manufacture 3.2 million sets of “high-performance all-steel radial tyres” and become an “all-steel radial tyre production base for heavy trucks”.
Kumho Tire representatives have confirmed reports that the South Korean tyremaker has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Saudi tyre business Black Arrow Tire Co (Blatco). However, the two parties differ on the degree of progress made with the talks.
Sailun Tire Americas
Sailun
MatteoBlvng; PxHere
Pirelli
Haohua Tire
GS Tire
Seyoun Tire
Blatco