Apollo invests in South Africa plant
Apollo Tyres chairman, Onkar S Kanwar, recently inaugurated a new Component Preparation Unit at the company’s Ladysmith tyre manufacturing facility in South Africa. This 6500 square metre unit came by virtue of 300 million rand (28.461 million euros, £23.031 million, US$35 million) investment and has a new calendering machine and triplex extrusion line. According to the company, the new addition has the potential for further expansion to facilitate future growth.
Speaking at the inaugural function Onkar S Kanwar outlined the challenges facing South African tyre manufacturers of high manufacturing and wage costs and the threat of cheaper imports: “Despite the challenges of the overall economy, at Apollo we will continue to invest in our people, plants and processes to strengthen Apollo Tyres South Africa for expansion into the African continent. South Africa has enormous potential and all of us need to work together to realise it.”
The new unit will remove capacity bottlenecks and further improve quality and productivity, while enabling capacity expansion. This component unit will feed both the Durban and Ladysmith manufacturing units of Apollo Tyres South Africa, thereby increasing the commercial vehicle tyre capacity of Durban by 20 per cent, and the Ladysmith passenger vehicle and light truck tyre capacity by 30 per cent.
Since the acquisition of the former Dunlop Tyre facilities in South Africa, Apollo has invested around R700 million (£53.741 million, 66.451 million euros, US$85 million) towards upgrading machinery and increasing manufacturing efficiencies in both plants.
Dr Luis Ceneviz, chief executive officer, Apollo Tyres South Africa (Pty) Ltd commented: “This is a continuation of our efforts to modernise and upgrade our plants to enable us to capitalise on upcoming growth across the African continent. In a similar manner given the acute shortage of skilled artisans, we have a programme in place to train young talent with mechanical aptitude. This has already brought into the fold young talent from the community.”
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