Yokohama Doubles Thailand Site Area

Yokohama Rubber Co has announced that, by the end of December, it will have purchased 193,327 square metres of land adjacent to Yokohama’s Thailand manufacturing plant. When the newly purchased land is added to the existing site, this means that the Thailand subsidiary will more than double in size, growing to 418,427 square meters. Upon completion of the expansion plans, Yokohama Thailand will have a larger site area than any other Yokohama rubber subsidiary.

The subsidiary will begin its first-phase operation in April 2005 with annual production capacity of 350,000 tyres. With the second-phase expansion plan, the production capacity will be expanded to 700,000 tyres a year. Yokohama Tire Manufacturing (Thailand) was founded in January 2004 as Yokohama Rubber’s subsidiary for manufacturing and marketing truck/bus steel radial tyres mainly for export. The company says it plans to make the plant subsidiary its largest comprehensive tyre production base overseas.

According to the Yokohama, the purchase of additional comes as part of a series of expansions plans it has been enacting in Japan, China and Thailand. Yokohama says it has chosen Thailand because it provides “high quality labour power, tax incentives for investment by a foreign company and better infrastructures.”