Discount Tire, a leading independent tyre and wheel retailer in the US is acquiring Tire Rack, which is known for its tyre tests and is a “consumer-direct source for tyres, wheels and performance accessories”. According to the company, the investment is part of Discount Tire’s vision of creating an “Easy, and Safe omnichannel, B2B, and fleet customer experience”. The transaction is expected to close on 31 December 2021.
Following the news that Halfords Group is buying Axle Group Holdings Ltd including 239 National Tyres garages and 60 mobile tyre fitting vans, further details relating to the transaction have emerged. Firstly, while company announcements refer to the purchase of “National”, Halfords’ latest acquisition actually sees the company purchase the entire issued share capital of Axle Group Holdings Ltd (“National”) for £62 million. And the transaction is expected to be completed on 9 December 2021.
According to Halfords, the acquisition of National Tyres delivers “on its strategy to become a Motoring Services focused business”. Halfords Autocentres has always been amongst the most profitable parts of the overall Halfords Group businesses and financial figures have consistently shown that autocentre-related revenue is amongst the fastest-growing parts of the group. But what the National Tyres acquisition specifically means is that what Halfords terms “motoring revenue” will “represent more than 70 per cent of Group pro-forma revenue”.
In addition to the acquisition of Axle Group/National Tyres, Halfords has also bought London-based Iverson Tyres, which describes itself as a “specialist supplier and fitter of tyres and provider of adjacent maintenance services”. Iverson Tyres was founded in 1992 and is made up of four locations in Chiswick, Hanwell, Northolt and Farnham Common.
Halfords is paying £62 million for National, the tyre and automotive servicing, maintenance and repair business, which operates under the National Tyres and Autocare, Viking Wholesale Tyres and Tyre Shopper brands. As a result, Halfords’ garage estate will grow by more than 60 per cent (from 372 to 604 garages), offering MOT, servicing, fitting and repair services. According to Halfords, this deal makes it “the largest vehicle service, maintenance and repair business in the UK, with the majority of UK households within a 20-minute drive of a Halfords garage.” However, Tyres & Accessories data suggests European Tyre Enterprises Ltd (ETEL), which incorporates 650 Kwik Fits in its portfolio, is still the largest in the UK with a total estate of 740 at the last count.
Otraco International is now part of Bridgestone Mining Solutions Australia. Bridgestone Corporation reports that after gaining regulatory approvals and satisfying other customary conditions, yesterday it completed the acquisition deal first announced in April. The OTR tyre management firm changed hands for AU$79 million (£42.4 million).
The completion of Goodyear’s takeover of Cooper on 7 June this year brought with it the first indications of the scale of Cooper’s sales in the Europe Middle East and Africa (EMEA) market. Before that point, Cooper only reported sales figures for their “International Tire Operations”, which includes sales generated worldwide outside EMEA.
Cabot Corporation has agreed to buy Tokai Carbon (Tianjin) Co. Ltd. from Tokai Carbon Group for US$9 million. The carbon black manufacturing facility was commissioned in 2006 and is located in close proximity to Cabot’s current carbon black and speciality compounds facility in Tianjin, China. Cabot will run the plant and intends to continue to supply current customers while conducting technology upgrades. The transaction is expected to close in the second quarter of 2022.
Germany’s Continental AG has signed an agreement to purchase a Trelleborg business – but this particular transaction has nothing to do with Trelleborg Wheel Systems or even tyres. The deal will see Trelleborg’s printing solutions business changing hands for an undisclosed sum. Continental says the acquisition will complement its surface solutions and printing technology portfolio, enhancing the company’s presence with industrial customers.
The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company has published figures that show its third-quarter 2021 sales were $4.9 billion, up 42 per cent compared with a year ago. Of course, much of this increase was driven by the company’s acquisition of Cooper Tire, but growth still came in at 16 per cent with the benefits of the Cooper merger excluded. At the same time, Goodyear executives also reported that the company now expects circa 50 per cent greater Cooper merger-related synergies than before. Specifically, this means a benefit of $250 million in run-rate synergies by mid-2023 up from an initial forecast of $165 million. And what’s more, the company expects to realize approximately $20 million of these savings in 2021. No estimates for 2022 synergies are being released until at least the end of 2021 and more likely February 2022 when full-year 2021 data has been processed.
On 1 November private equity firm One Rock Capital Partners LLC announced that it had completed the previously announced acquisition of the Eastman Chemical Company tyre additives business. Now the company is being renamed as Flexsys, a tribute to the legacy name of the business. The acquisition of Flexsys marks One Rock’s sixth corporate carve-out transaction in 2021.
Australian tyre wholesaler National Tyre & Wheel Limited (NTAW) has signed the necessary paperwork for its acquisition of Black Rubber Pty Ltd and Black Rubber Sydney Pty Limited. The transaction, which took place yesterday and is valued at AU$26.3 million (£14.5 million), brings Black Rubber’s import and retreading businesses into the NTAW fold.
Maxam Tire Latin America (LATAM) will acquire and control the full equity interest in the LATAM Joint Venture (JV) on 31 October 2021. The 2015 JV was previously in place with Gustavo Lima and Marco Zigni and structured to expand the Maxam brand in the region via strategic partnership.
BA Bush & Son has continued to progress its expansion plans with the acquisition of Rotherham based tyre company Allround Tyres. As the latest part of the tyre distribution and servicing group, BA Bush said the company will continue to offer tyres, exhausts, and batteries as well as vehicle servicing, repairs, diagnostics, and MOTs. Allround Tyres also offers a mobile fitting service to the local area.
Michelin has added the last 60 per cent of leading French tyre e-tailer Allopneus to the 40 per cent stake the leading tyremaker bought in 2015. Michelin now “intends to develop its knowledge of customer behaviour and the purchasing process and thus continue to offer the best possible experience, from online information seeking, right up to tyre fitting”, company representatives wrote in a statement dated 25 August.
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Allopneus; Michelin