India
Herve Frederic Richert will step down as chief executive officer of Birla Tyres Limited as of tomorrow. Richert, whose industry experience includes two decades at Michelin and a seven-year stint at Giti Tire, tendered his resignation with the Indian tyre maker on 7 July.
In June we reported that Apollo Tyres is providing original equipment tyres to the Hyundai Alcazar, a compact crossover SUV that the South Korean car maker is manufacturing in and for India. JK Tyre has also announced that it is supplying OEM tyres for the Alcazar, in this instance its UX Royale.
One of India’s largest suppliers of retreading materials has a new chief executive officer. As of June 2021, Vijay Shrinivas is chief executive of Indag Rubber Ltd. He succeeds Kewal Krishan Kapur, who’d had been with the company since 2001.
Madhavi Kanumoory has been appointed as Chief Digital & Information Officer at Birla Carbon. In this role, she will be responsible for all aspects of the company’s digital and information technology. Kanumoory will report to John Loudermilk, Chief Operating Officer, joining the company’s Senior Management Team and will be based at the Birla Carbon office in Mumbai.
The Hyundai Alcazar was launched recently on Apollo Apterra Cross tyres. Within few months of its launch, Apollo Apterra Cross has been chosen as the standard fitment tyre for the Hyundai Alcazar in 18-inch tyre size. This is also the first OE fitment approval received for Apterra Cross tyres, which was launched in March this year.
Roughly two years after he was appointed Ceat Ltd VP of marketing, Amit Tolani has been named chief executive of Ceat Specialty, effective 1 June 2021. Ceat Specialty has its EU office in Amsterdam and has been serving European farm and OTR tyre customers since 2017. Tolani joined Ceat in 2004 and has served in various roles across sales, marketing and supply chain functions. Prior to his latest appointment, he was the chief marketing officer of CEAT.
Mahansaria Tyres Private Limited (MTPL) has made an agreement in-principle with Tyres International Inc (TI) to buy a majority stake in the US-based tyre wholesaler. According to MTPL, the move is the latest part of its bid to build a global, market leading off-Highway tyre business and the first part of MTPL plans to build its distribution network in North America.
Several days ago, Apollo Tyres informed the BSE stock exchange regarding the temporary closure of its Perambra factory in India’s Kerala state. The company said it had paused production in Perambra and closed the facility in order to comply with the current pandemic situation and directives issued by local authorities. The tyre maker reports that the plant will remain closed until 23 May.
Apollo Tyres has recorded strong growth in the fourth quarter of its 2020/21 financial year (April 2020 to March 2021). Consolidated revenues from global operations grew 39 per cent to close at 50.26 billion rupees (£486 million – all conversions based on rates on 14 May) in quarter four. For the full year of FY21, it grew 6 per cent to close at 173.97 billion rupees (£1.68 billion). Apollo reports that operating profit (EBITDA excluding other income) was up 70 per cent in Q4, while for the full year, it was up 44 per cent.
Off-highway tyre specialist BKT reassures its partners and customers that, despite the worrying news from India of late, it has worked hard to protect both its workforce and production. In response to the messages of concern the BKT team in India have received from around the world, the tyre maker expresses thankfulness that so many people have been in contact and are worrying about people’s health and safety.
Tyre maker Ceat Limited has raised its shareholding in Indian online tyre retailer Tyresnmore Online Private Limited to 44.17 per cent. Ceat paid Rs 24 million (£234,000) to acquire an additional 3.47 per cent in the company.
Following the inaugural edition in Goa two years back as well as thousands of smaller editions in different locations over the last 24 months, Apollo Tyres’ #BadRoadBuddies concept returns in a digital format. Since most of the activations have moved to the virtual space, the company has also chosen to build the community of enthusiasts online and is opening this event to SUV owners/drivers and the two-wheeler riders, who enjoy drives during the weekend or on leisure/adventure trips.
Apollo Tyres has launched a new tyre range to satisfy demand in India’s fast-growing compact SUV market. The tyre maker says it has introduced the Apollo Apterra Cross following two years of development and testing, and will initially offer the range in five sizes for 16- and 17-inch rim diameters. While Apollo Tyres currently has no plans to bring the Apterra Cross to Europe, it intends to distribute the range in ASEAN and SAARC markets at a later date.
Does the hyper-elasticity of retreaded tyres impact their behavioural quality? Uday Gudsoorkar and Rupa Bindu, two researchers working within the department of mechanical engineering at the Dr DY Patil Institute of Technology in Pune, India sought to answer this question and more by using computer-aided finite element analysis. Their paper “Computer simulation of hyper elastic re-treaded tire rubber with ABAQUS”, which was published in November 2020 in Materials Today: Proceedings used a combination of qualitative and quantitative methodologies to measures forces across the tread belt in a compute simulation. These virtual samples were then compared with laboratory examples. According to the paper, the researchers’ findings are “promising to predict the behaviour of re-treaded tyre rubber” and can be “used to improve the product [retreaded truck tyres] and its utility in small tyre re-treaders, customers and policymakers.”
Dutch tyre brand Vredestein is coming to India. During an investor call this month, parent company Apollo Tyres confirmed that Vredestein products are being manufactured in this market and will be introduced locally during the first quarter of 2021.
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