Hungarian Manufacturers Scale Back Production

Tyre manufacturers in Hungary are reducing production due to a drop in demand, reports the business daily Világgazdaság. Hankook Tyre’s facility in Dunaújváros is operating at about 90 per cent capacity in the first half of the year, managing director Lee Sang Il informed the paper. The plant’s 1,200 workers will turn out about 5 million tyres in 2009. In 2008, the plant produced 4 million tyres, though it did not reach capacity until October. Hankook is also delaying the completion of an expansion at the facility until 2011. The first phase of the project, which will cost a total of 500 million euros, is already more than 60 per cent completed. When the capacity expansion is completed, the plant will raise staff numbers to over 1,500.

Michelin has reduced the working week from seven days to six at its plant in Nyíregyháza, a passenger car tyre facility with an annual capacity of 900,000 units. The company has also reduced the working week at its Budapest truck tyre plant to four days a week.

Bridgestone did not tell the paper about production at its plant in the city of Tatabánya, however the manufacturer recently reported suspending production at five of its plants in Europe. The company’s Hungarian plant, which Bridgestone spent 190 million euros to build and inaugurated last year, was to have made a daily 8,000 tyres from the first half of 2009.