Qizhou Rubber Focuses on OTR Tyres and Retreading

After the company was founded in 1998, the Qingdao Qizhou Rubber Co., Ltd. has developed and produced various kinds of commercial tyres. Now it seems the company is going in a new direction and will specialise more in its OTR tyre business.

Three years ago this relatively young company invested some $14 million into what it named the “OTR tyre project”. In this project Qizhou has increased its bias OTR tyre production capacity up to 100,000 units per year until September 2004. The equipment necessary for the second production facility was mainly bought from Japanese suppliers, the company writes in a publication. The company produces its OTR tyres under two brand names: “Marcher” and “Worldwide”. Don’t misunderstand the brand names, Marcher is actually generally considered as the export brand whereas Worldwide is mainly sold on the domestic tyre market. Currently Qizhou offers bias OTR tyres up to 51 inch in diameter (36.00-51). Next year it will also launch its first 57-inch OTR tyre.

According to a company publication, Qizhou is looking to further increase its OTR tyre productions capacity. The company says it wants to install a production line with a capacity of 200,000 radial OTR tyres. For this Qizhou would have to invest up to $127 million according to the calculations, the OTR manufacturer is looking for a partner to actually shoulder the costs involved in this new project. Right now there is neither a potential investment partner nor the technology available, it was explained at Qizhou’s stand at the CITExpo show in Shanghai. Consequently, the OTR radial tyre project won’t be put into place within the near future.

Also, as was earlier reported by Tyres & Accessories, Qizhou Rubber will tackle another new project in the near future. This is the installation of a retreading plant utilising an Amerityre licence. A press release from Amerityre mentioned that the licence deal would cost Qizhou about $400,000 fees for the next two years. Although the Chinese partners won’t confirm this figure, construction for the new retreading plant are already under way.

This plant will be Qizhou’s third plant. In the first stage the Chinese company is going to invest about $10 million into the facility. Further enlargement projects are already envisaged and covered with the construction measures. In the course of the coming six to eight months the first retreaded OTR tyres produced according to the Amerityre licence will be available on the market. Right now Qizhou Rubber is the only licensee that Amerityre has signed up in China. Following the plans of the company, about 10,000 retreaded OTR tyres will be produced at Qizhou annually once the production site is operating.