Hannover-based Continental AG is a leading automotive supplier and – according to the company – is “the choice of leading car manufacturers, offering award-winning tyres that deliver responsive braking in all weather conditions.”
The European Commission has announced that its inquiry deadline for Continental AG’s proposed 11.4 billion euro acquisition of the VDO Automotive Division from Siemens has been set for November 15. No further details were given at the time.
Hankook Tire recently announced that it has ranked fifth in the mass market/non-luxury segment of J.D. Power’s ‘2007 OE Tire Customer Satisfaction Study’. The manufacturer attributes this respectable placing to the company’s increasing focus on quality service and production, and its consistent investment of approximately five per cent of annual revenue into R&D.
Hankook Tire scored 810 out of 1,000 points, outperforming Bridgestone, Dunlop, Yokohama and Continental. The study measures overall customer satisfaction with their original equipment tyres, examining five key factors: wearability, appearance, traction/grip, ride and handling. Rankings are based on owner experiences with their tyres during the first year of ownership. Hankook Tire jumped its rank for third consecutive year; escalating from tenth in 2004 to eighth in 2005, sixth in 2006 and fifth in this year.
A number of leading independent tyre dealers throughout Europe have joined together to launch a new pan-European network of tyre service professionals. This network, known as TEN (Tyre European Network), brings together more than 2,100 dealer locations and 6,000 affiliated tyre specialists from across the UK and continental Europe. At the core of TEN are a number of national groups including Tyrenet from the UK, Germany’s Top Service Team, Profile Tyrecenter in the Netherlands and Belgium, Italy’s Tyreteam and SEAS 24 in Spain and Portugal. Discussions are also currently underway with tyre organisations in a further six countries.
The network will offer fleet managers the reassurance of a single, fully operational European network combined with the flexibility of brand choice from highly professional independent dealers providing services whenever and wherever they are needed. Mike Riley, the inaugural vice president of TEN and managing director of Tyrenet in the UK, says: “TEN is an extremely exciting development for the tyre industry that will enable fleets and transport companies to manage their costs as effectively as possible and will allow tyre manufacturers to offer their products in locations where they do not already have a presence. It is a win-win situation for the tyre industry and all our customers.”
The distribution facility in China jointly set up by Continental and the logistics cooperation Penske/Honold has entered operation. On October 1 the Shanghai Regional Distribution Center (RDC) took over from the temporary RDC, opened in March, as the official site for operations. The interim facility will now be closed down.
“For Continental, this [the RDC] represents a logical next step in the development of Asian distribution, Following the large-scale restructuring of logistics in Malaysia, China is the next challenge to be tackled,” stated Carsten Sziegoleit, head of warehousing and tyre distribution worldwide at Continental.
The launching of logistics operations in China is based essentially on the introduction of Continental’s established logistic processes and systems. Lean processes with a minimum of interfaces have already been successfully tested in China, ensuring that the new RDC will get off to a good start. With Penske as partner in China, Continental is relying on a well-established service provider, backed up by the experience of Honold Reifenlogistik, a company specialising in tyres. Honold already serves Continental with over 100,000 square metres of warehousing.
The Goodyear Eagle F1 Asymmetric has been declared ‘Best Tyre’ by Autocar magazine, just a month after the new tyre’s domination of the Evo Magazine tyre test. Autocar tested Goodyear, Michelin, Continental, Pirelli and Bridgestone tyres on both front wheel drive and rear wheel drive cars. The Goodyear was the clear overall winner after winning in both categories.
The renowned UK weekly magazine had chosen the 138bhp Mondeo TDCi and the 268bhp Mercedes C350 to give a comparison between a typical large family car and a powerful rear wheel drive sports saloon respectively.
Pneumatic Components Ltd. (PCL) is putting pressure on the continent with the appointment of Export Sales Executive Natalie Wilmot. Wilmot, a business and languages graduate from Chesterfield, will be based at the company’s HQ in Sheffield, and will be responsible for developing French and Spanish speaking markets in Europe and internationally.
With PCL launching new products at Equip Auto in October 2007, and able to display the prestigious “A La Bonne Foi” handshake symbol on products, symbolising competence to manufacture and verify tyre inflation equipment, the appointment is well timed.
The future of the UK tyre industry belongs to those who invest in their staff, believes David Boulton from Entyrety. Boulton, technical sales manager for the Birmingham based supplier of tyre and fleet training and support services, is concerned that a lack of investment in training will not only perpetuate existing bad workplace practices, but also will ultimately drag these businesses down.
“It is well known that in certain areas of retailing there is a shortage of good tyre technician/fitters,” comments Boulton, adding that this problem stems from a lack of investment over many years in the people who carry out this function. As a consequence, he believes, in some areas the ‘interface’ between the tyre industry and the public has been found wanting. “There has been some improvement in recent years,” admits Boulton, “but this is only in the businesses who recognise that to safeguard their future they have to invest in their staff and provide training and development schemes. These will be the companies that survive long-term, and those that do not invest could face a bleaker future.”
During the past year Continental has sold 19.1 million winter tyres worldwide, about 1.5 million more than in 2005. This season the German manufacturer is promoting its ContiWinterContact TS 810 and ContiWinterContact TS 810 Sport models for mid-size and luxury classes of cars, as well as for sports vehicles. And smaller vehicles can get off to a safe start in the cold season with the ContiWinterContact TS 800.
The ContiWinterContact TS 810 Sport is designed for highly tuned cars with powerful engines. Thanks to an extremely asymmetrical tread concept, it offers what Conti believes to be the very best driving performance under all wintry road conditions, outstanding handling characteristics on dry and wet roads, and a wide margin of safety on snow-covered roads. Approved for speeds of up to 270 km/h, it is available in some sizes as an SSR model with extended mobility features.
The ContiWinterContact TS 810 combines superb properties on winter roads with comfortable design. The tyre’s developers place a strong emphasis on short braking distances and high traction – even on snow-covered roads – as well as good aquaplaning resistance and minimum road noise. Another plus this technically sophisticated tyre has to offer is increased mileage performance.
Hang your heads in shame, men of Britain, your counterparts on the other side of the Irish Sea are much more tyre savvy – and chivalrous – than you! This blow to the nation’s collective self-esteem comes courtesy of a survey conducted by Continental, which reveals that, perhaps, tyres may not always bring out what’s best in us.
Men in the UK are much more likely to leave changing a tyre to a woman driver than men in Ireland, says Conti. Nearly half of us would be perfectly happy to sit back while she throws some muscle behind hoisting the car’s jack into position, where only three out of ten gents from the Emerald Isle would do the same. And a third of British men confessed to using any excuse to weasel their way out of the task, compared with just one in seven Irish men.
And, to further rub salt into the wound, we’re not just un-gallant when it comes to tyres – when the rubber hits the road we’re also much more afraid of dealing with the rubber that hits the road. Almost all men surveyed in Ireland – 94 per cent of them – claimed to have changed a tyre at some time, compared with just over half of men in Britain. Conti reports that the most commonly used reason for not changing a car tyre was that it might ruin one’s clothes. This excuse was used by a whopping 47 per cent of UK based respondents.
Continental Tyres has put together a comprehensive guide to the differing tyre requirements British truck and coach operators expecting to run their vehicles in European countries this winter have to meet. Draconian penalties – including an absolute ban on entering certain countries – will apply to vehicles not properly equipped when there is ice or snow to contend with. Countries including Austria, Germany, Italy, France and Switzerland are covered and the Conti guide – available free of charge to operators – spells where special cold weather tyres are required and when snow chains have to be fitted.
The 50 millionth tyre has rolled off the production line at Continental’s Timisoara tyre plant. The Romanian factory manufactures tyres in 13”, 14”, 15” and 16” rim sizes for the European replacement market as well as for a wide range of manufacturers in the automotive industry. The factory opened in October 2000, stretching across 165.000 m² and now employs 1100 people. Timisoara manufactures more than 40,000 tyres a day. Production volume has grown from 1.2 million tyres in 2001 to more than 10 million tyres in 2006.
As part of Continental’s focus on environmentally friendly tyres and production, Timisoara is the only manufacturing plant in Romania to be accepted onto the European Registry of Environmental Protection in Brussels. The factory is also equipped with a modern environmentally friendly boiler house where methane gas fuelled boilers transform water into industrial steam for the tyre production process.
Michelin and Bridgestone are the dominant online tyre brands, according to the latest research. The report, exclusively published in Tyres & Accessories for the last three years, was conducted by Cambridge-based online brand monitoring specialists, Envisional and found that Pirelli was the biggest faller in its unique online brand ranking exercise.
The analysis shows that the Michelin brand, as observed in previous years, continues to stand well clear of its rivals. Envisional found that this brand achieves the greatest degree of “online prominence” by a significant margin, though this lead has narrowed again since 2006. The top six most prominent brands are the same as those observed in 2005 and 2006 and there is still a sharp drop between the six leaders and the chasing pack.
Continental continues its market leading OE position with a different type of vehicle. The latest success story for the Continental Industrial Tyres team is the skiers’ best friend, Kaessbohrers ski-slope preparation vehicle.
Continental’s CSE tyres will spring into action at the start of the skiing season preparing the slopes removing bumps and ruts at popular ski resorts across Europe. For many years, Continental Industrial Tyres have supplied the tensioning wheels and tyres for this application. The most recent win was negotiated between Kaessbohrer, the ski slope vehicle manufacturer, Continental and their rim supplier Lemmerz. Continental has now boosted its tensioning wheel market share from 60 per cent to 100 per cent.
Toyo Tyre UK Ltd has announced that (as of 3 September) Nick Manning has been appointed as Marketing Manager for the UK. Manning joined Toyo from respected wholesaler Group Tyre. Prior to serving there as director of purchasing for two years, he was General Sales Manager at Continental Car Dealer Business Unit. In fact, Manning progressed through a series of positions at Continental over an impressive 18 years including pricing, strategy and marketing before leaving for Group.
By purchasing Siemens VDO, Continental AG, Hanover, will profit from key automotive industry trends to a greater degree in the future, the company said in a recent statement. “The perspectives for the industry as shown at the IAA 2007 clearly confirm our view that the prevailing topics in the years to come will be safety, climate protection, and infotainment. With the consolidated innovative prowess and the extensive product portfolio of Continental and Siemens VDO, we feel we are excellently positioned as a systems specialist,” said Manfred Wennemer, chairman of the Continental Executive Board, at the International Motor Show on Wednesday in Frankfurt/Main.
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