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Goodyear India: Annual Results

For the year-ended December 2004, Goodyear India recorded a turnover increase of 26 per cent to 7.031 billion rupees (£88.3 million), while the operating profit margin dropped to 3.6 per cent from 4.7 per cent. Helped by the sharp drop in the interest costs, the post-tax earnings rose to 52 million rupees from 10 million rupees the year before. The company repaid high-cost debt by borrowing from its parent Goodyear Tire, US. As a result, the interest cost dropped to 75 million to 133 million rupees.

23rd May 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

Winning start by Team MRF in Australia

The first round of the 2005 Asia Pacific Rally Championship (APRC) that was run as the Subaru Rally, Canberra, Australia kicked up plenty of dust in more ways than one. When the dust and din settled, debutant Jussi Valimaki (co-driver Jarkko Kalliolepo) from Finland, driving a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VIII for Team MRF Tyres (India), emerged as the winner. However, the 30-year old Finn, nicknamed “Fast Jussi” had to wait for the several hours that it took the Stewards to conduct scrutiny and then exclude first placed Toshi Arai of Japan.

An obviously elated Valimaki said: “This was a good first rally with a new team, new car and new tyres and I’m very happy with the result. I am sure with some more time we can get faster – it’s the biggest win of my career.”

19th May 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

JK Tyre Tops JD Power India Survey

JK Tyre has received the highest ranking in a customer satisfaction survey of tyres purchased in India. Moving up from third position in 2004, JK Tyre topped the 2005 JD Power list with a satisfaction score of 781 index points on a 1,000-point scale. The industry in general performed marginally better growing one percentage point year-on-year.

6th May 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

JK Tyres to Expand Production, Build New Factory

JK Tyres is planning to expand the production capacity of its Banmore, Gwalior facility in Madhya Pradesh. According to India’s Business Report, the company will invest 2 billion rupees (roughly £24.2 million) over the next three years in the expansion. The company has reportedly already invested 700 – 800 million rupees in the facility.

In addition to the expansion plans, the company also intends to set up another plant in the area. The announcements come despite a dip in Indian tyre industry profits due to increasing raw material costs.

4th May 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

India: The Fastest Growing Car Producer in the World

(India/Rubber Asia) In 2004 India recorded the fastest growth among the top 15 passenger car producing countries in the world, according to the Paris-based International Organisation of Motor Vehicle Manufacturers (OICA). As per the OICA’s latest rankings, India’s car production grew 30 per cent in 2004. Brazil came second with 17 per cent growth. What’s more, India is just a step away from being one of the 10 largest automobile producers in the world. The country jumped up two places to 11th.

29th April 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

Cheap Imports and High Costs Forces Indian Tyre Firms to Downsize

(India/Rubber Asia) Cheap imports from China and to a lesser extent from Thailand and South Korea, coupled with rising raw material costs are posing a serious challenge to the Indian tyre industry, Apollo Tyres chief operating officer Mr Neeraj Kanwar has said.

25th April 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

Automechanika Asia ‘A Success’

Feedback from the fourth Automechanika Asia trade fair, held in Kuala Lumpur in early April, has been voted a success by visitors and exhibitors.

There were 126 exhibitors from 17 countries (Australia, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Iran, Italy, Korea, Malaysia, Netherlands, Philippines, PR China, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, UK and USA).

25th April 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

Brityrex is Back

Next month sees the much anticipated return of Brityrex. After an eight year absence the show is returning to Harrogate as Brityrex International and the organisers, ECI International, are determined to deliver exactly what they promised from the beginning – an exhibition dedicated to the tyre and related industries. Tyres & Accessories caught up with event organisers, Paul Farrant and Rowena Suthers, of ECI international, to discuss the up and coming event, in this, the final countdown to the show.

There hasn’t been a UK tyre trade show for years, so why re-launch the show?

“The UK is an important market and it should have its own tyre show,” enthused Rowena Suthers, when asked about the company’s decision to revive the show. Brityrex dates back to 1979 and was seen as the only opportunity for the UK tyre industry to get together and exhibit its wares. Tyre Exhibitions held the last show in 1997, an exhibition that Paul Farrant and Rowena Suthers, now ECI International, were originally involved with. As well as having first hand experience of the show itself, the organisers also bring with them the knowledge gained from running the successful exhibition, Tyrexpo Asia. Together the pair have 38 years of experience in organising exhibitions and as frequent exhibitors themselves they know what exhibitors want as well as what the tyre trade wants.

“UK legislation is changing and shows like Reifen and SEMA can’t satisfy the needs of companies present in the UK market. Brityrex was never intended to be a Reifen or a Sema but it was meant to be as important to the UK market as they are to their respective markets,” explained Rowena. And what about demand for a UK show? “As the second largest market in Europe there is demand there, it’s an important market, it has always had its own event and it deserves to have its own show.”

25th April 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

US Panel Decides to Keep Steel Tariffs

(Akron/Tire Review) The US International Trade Commission voted 4-2 yesterday to retain tariffs on steel imports, saying that removing the duties would further hurt the struggling US steel industry. The tariffs specifically cover steel from Japan, Brazil and Russia. Duties on flat-rolled steel range from 20 per cent to 50 per cent, and were imposed about five years ago.

18th April 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

Michelin to Use Technology to Break Away

By Alex Law
MacLeans magazine

“Nunc est bibendum.”

Horace originally meant that to be a call to merriment, or, in a more literal translation, “Now is the time to drink.”

When Michelin first used the phrase decades ago on an advertising poster, it was the tagline to a sketch of a man made out of tyres (now known as Bibendum) who was looking down a stretch of pavement filled with the kind of debris normally found on the world’s roads at the time. The message then meant, “I can handle all that.”

11th April 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

Indian Rubber Industry Consumes 1 Million Tonnes

(Rubber Asia/India) The Indian rubber industry used up a total of over a million tonnes of various types of rubber during 2003/04, according to data compiled by the Automotive tyre Manufacturers Association (ATMA).

Of this, the tyre industry alone (including cycle tyres & tubes and camelback) consumed 478,734 tonnes of natural rubber — 66.5 per cent of all natural rubber (NR) consumed by the Indian industry as a whole. The tyre segment was also by far the largest consumer of synthetic rubber (140,960 tonnes out of a total of 210,190 tonnes) and reclaimed rubber (38,532 tonnes out of 70,460).

More importantly, the Indian auto tyre segment still has 73.34 per cent of its rubber consumption in the form of natural rubber with synthetic rubber (SR) accounting for 23.73 per cent and reclaimed rubber 2.93 per cent. This NR:SR ratio is almost the reverse of the pattern elsewhere in the tyre-making world.

7th April 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

Michelin’s Commercial JV in India

Michelin-Apollo Tyres (MATL) has entered a joint venture with Tata Motors and Ashok Leyland, India’s two biggest commercial vehicle makers, in a bid to sell radial tyres.

The $85 million venture, to manufacture truck and bus radial tyres will commence by June 2006, reports BS Online, adding that the Pune plant will reach a capacity of 350,000 units by 2009-10.

31st March 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

Michelin Apollo To Make Passenger Radials?

Michelin Apollo is eyeing the possibility of producing passenger car tyres, perhaps even tyres for India’s large two-wheeler market, Asian news sources have reported. The news comes as the company prepares to enter the Indian truck and bus tyre market with radial products.

According to Herve Dub, chief executive, there are no definite plans for car tyre production but he concedes that plenty of market assessment is underway. Currently the company imports Michelin brand tyres into the market, although it is aiming to begin producing within India by the end of 2005. Capacity at the company’s $85 milllion joint venture is expected to hit 350,000 tyres per annum by the end of the decade.

22nd March 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

MRF Plans to Protect Profits

(India/Rubber Asia) The profits of MRF, one of India’s largest tyre makers, are continuing to come under pressure. With raw material costs showing no signs of easing, the company is resisting attempts to pass cost pressures onto consumers. Chairman and MD, K M Mammen summed up the situation when he admitted that the company was searching for areas where is could rein costs in to “protect our profits.”

21st March 2005/by Tyrepress Editors

“Ceat-Kelani JV Has Had Exceptional Success”

(India/Rubber Asia) When the Indo-Lanka Free Trade Agreement (FTA) was signed in December 1998, informed opinion may have considered it experimental. In Sri Lanka, the questions raised were: “Will Indian goods flood the Sri Lanka market?” and “Does Sri Lanka have the resources to penetrate the vast Indian market?”

The FTA became operational in March 2000, and trade across the Palk Strait has expanded significantly since then. When the Sri Lankan and Indian Prime Ministers met in June 2002, they decided to widen the scope of cooperation under the FTA which dealt with trade and tariffs, to include services, technology and investment, thus moving the two economies towards greater integration and propelling them forward to a Comprehensive Econonomic Partnership Agreement (CEPA).

21st March 2005/by Tyrepress Editors