Pirelli Builds New Romanian Factory

Pirelli is to build a new tyre plant in Romania, The Cumberland News has reported. The new Romanian tyre plant will reportedly be of a comparable size to the Pirelli factory at Cummersdale near Carlisle and will initially produce 4.5 million tyres a year. However, unlike the Carlisle plant, which specialises in 4×4 tyres, the Romanian plant will produce the full range of Pirelli products, the newspaper reported.

John Nixon, Pirelli’s Carlisle-based industrial and logistics director, said the Romanian plant will start production at the end of next year. “The workers will be paid about one fifth of what we’re paying in Europe but that’s where they are as a country, and not part of the European Union. You can get people working there for 200 euros a month. But at this point in time there is no need to be concerned at all. There are no plans to take any volume away from here at all.”

Pirelli doesn’t see the fact that it is also negotiating to launch a tyre production joint venture in China as a problem. Mr Nixon points to the “huge” and growing market for the kind of tyres produced in Carlisle. However, the Carlisle plant needs to remain competitive and plans to build a huge wind turbine to generate electricity. Mr Nixon is on record as saying that this is “vital” to the Carlisle plant’s future. If approved, the project will generate energy savings worth £250,000 a year for ten years, he said.