Japan Archives - Page 26 of 58 - Tyrepress

Tag Archive for: Japan

Bridgestone now supplying Indian market with local TBR production

Truck and bus tyre production has commenced at Bridgestone’s Indore factory in India’s Madhya Pradesh State. The Bridgestone India facility, which has been producing passenger car tyres since 1998, was expanded to cater for the country’s growing demand for truck and bus radials through an Rs 1,700 million (£22.8 million) investment. Bridgestone India anticipates producing around 200 TBR tyres per day at the plant by the end of this year and twice that number by mid-2012.

15th June 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Michelin tops Japan customer satisfaction survey. Again

For an eighth consecutive year, Michelin has come up trumps in J.D. Power Asia Pacific’s survey of customer satisfaction amongst winter tyre users in Japan. The French tyre maker has held this distinction in every Japan Winter Tire Customer Satisfaction Index Study since the first was held seven years ago; in 2011 it performed “particularly well” in all six tested factors and scored 653 points out of a possible 1,000; second-placed brand Bridgestone was, with 609 points, also ranked above the industry average of 583 points. Trailing in last place for customer satisfaction in the eight-brand study was Falken, with 515 points.

31st May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Yokohama Tire appoints new president and CEO

Takao Oishi, who has headed up Yokohama Tire Corporation (YTC) in the US since April 2008, is returning to Japan to take up the position of general manager of Yokohama Rubber’s Industrial Products business group. Taking his place as president and CEO of YTC is Yasushi Tanaka, who begins in the role on June 29. Tanaka, previously in charge of corporate planning within Yokohama Rubber’s GD100 Promotion department, will be based at YTC’s corporate headquarters in Fullerton, California. His promotion also includes being named president of Yokohama Corporation of America and president of Yokohama Corporation of North America. Tanaka remains a Yokohama Rubber corporate officer.

26th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Michelin targets fast-growing markets with Energy XM2

The world is becoming increasingly mobile and vehicle parcs in emerging markets are swelling through first-time car purchases. In many countries motorists travel on a road infrastructure not designed with such volumes of traffic or modern vehicle technology in mind, and for this reason products designed for Western Europe may not present the best solution there; affordable technical solutions that accommodate differing conditions are required. This certainly applies to tyres. Concurrent to the Michelin Challenge Bibendum 2011, an event described as the global summit for sustainable mobility, Michelin released a new product aimed primarily at emerging markets, the Energy XM2.

24th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Yokohama commits to Green Wave 2011

Those wishing to catch the Green Wave don’t have long to wait – the global tree planting campaign advocated by the United Nations Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity is taking place on May 22 – the International Day for Biological Diversity. In Japan, however, the Green Wave has already been washing over the land for more than two months, as the country’s government declared the 16 weeks between March 1 and June 15 its “Green Wave 2011” period. During this time schools, companies and organisations have been encouraged to carry out tree planting campaigns. It goes without saying that Yokohama Rubber, whose Forever Forest programme is now in its fourth year, has embraced the programme.

18th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

New Malaysia factory to meet Toyo's Asian demand

Construction on Toyo Tire & Rubber’s new factory in Malaysia is expected to begin this year and production in 2013. Japanese media organisation Nikkei reports the tyre maker will invest around 20 billion yen (£153 million) in a six million passenger car tyre per annum plant that will primarily meet demand in China, India and other emerging Asian markets. According to Nikkei the new plant, which complements the newly-acquired three million tyre per year Silverstone plant, will make Malaysia Toyo’s main Asian centre of production outside of Japan. By 2015, will produce 12.5 million units in Asia each year, Nikkei adds.

17th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Falken Motorsport driver anticipates quick Nürburgring 24-Hr with new Porsche

Back in January, the Falken Motorsport Team announced that it would return to the Nürburgring 24 Hour race on 25-26 June running a GT3 R specification Porsche 911, in a break from its tradition of Japanese sports cars. Peter Dumbreck, will be racing the car in this year’s 24 Hours, also breaking from Japanese manufactured cars, exemplified by his Nissan GTR drive in this year’s GT1 World Championship, though he notes that he has “driven a few Porsches earlier in my career including the Alzen 996 Turbo and 996 and 997 Cup cars in the Carrera Cup six or seven years ago. I’ve also driven an older RSR at the Nurburging in 2005”. Previewing the event for Falken, Dumbreck talked about the differences between driving Porsche models, such as the 997, and Nissan’s GTR, including his impressions of the Falken tyre specifications for the former, on which they have been tested.

13th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Ben Butlin new global research director a JATO Dynamics

Ben Butlin has joined research firm JATO Dynamics as global research director. Prior to JATO, Butlin’s career included 17 years at Ford where he began as a professional mechanical engineer. His role developed into overseeing quality, product planning and project management with international assignments in Belgium, USA and Japan. His most recent role at Ford was global CV product planning manager where he was responsible for the alignment of LCV product planning across all regions.

12th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Rock for Japan – Yokohama HPT to host charity concert

The UK distributor for Japanese tyre manufacturer Yokohama has organised a charity rock concert to support the British Red Cross Japan Tsunami Appeal. Yokohama HPT Ltd has covered the cost of the concert, so that 100 per cent of the proceeds will go directly to the appeal and support the victims of the earthquake and tsunami in March. The 'Sounds for Sendai' concert will take place on Sunday 22 May at the Marshall Amplification Theatre in Milton Keynes and will feature a stunning line-up headlined by the renowned Martin Turner's Wishbone Ash with support acts Stray and Motherlode.

11th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Forever Forest progressing well, Yokohama reports

The planting of trees as part of Yokohama Rubber’s ‘Forever Forest’ project began as a means of creating a greener environment at the company’s facilities in the years leading up to its centenary in 2017, and so far around 183,000 of the planned half a million trees have been planted. In addition to planting trees at its Japanese and international sites, as part of the project Yokohama Rubber has committed itself to supply seedlings to external organisations and companies. During the first three years of the scheme it supplied nearly 50,000 seedlings to outside groups – from the project’s commencement until the end of March 2011 some 37,000 seedlings were planted in Japan and 13,000 overseas at a total of 81 sites. Each seedling planted was raised from a seed by Yokohama employees.

10th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Government acclaim for Yokohama inner liner development

Two Yokohama Rubber employees have been acknowledged by Japan’s government for their work on developing tyre inner liner technology. Yuichi Hara and Yoshiaki Hashimura, both research and development managers at Yokohama, received “Commendations for Science and Technology” from Japan’s Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science. The awards were given in the development category for developing a tyre inner liner that possesses a balance between the low air permeability of resin and the flexibility offered by rubber, thereby substantially reducing air leakage despite being only 20 per cent as thick as a conventional liner. The product developed by the pair and their research teams was released in 2009 under the name Advanced inner liner.

9th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Diesel, fleet purchases support April car registrations figures

The April UK new car market fell by 7.4 per cent to 137,746 units, according to the latest figures issued by the SMMT. However, the market was 1.5 per cent ahead of forecast and said to be “on par with the 2010 market” if take the scrappage volumes out of consideration. Year-to-date, registrations over the first four months of 2011 were down 8.5 per cent to 696,082 units, leaving the SMMT’s full-year forecast unchanged at 1.93 million units.

Despite the tough market conditions, fleet demand reportedly remains robust, up 6.5 per cent in April, while diesel volumes also recorded strong growth. Diesel cars represented 52.7 per cent of the total market in April and have shown year-on-year growth in every month of 2011. The VW Golf was the best selling diesel in April. Alternatively fuelled car registrations rose by 48.1 per cent in April.

6th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Bridgestone Bikers Club riding for Japan

Motorcyclists looking to combine a day out with helping a good cause may be interested in an event organised by the Bridgestone Biker’s Club. Scheduled for Sunday June 5, the biker meet will start from Wheelhouse Tyres in Birmingham; money raised will used to help victims of Japan’s recent earthquake and tsunami.

4th May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Yokohama reports Japan disaster relief activities

Giving an update on its assistance to relief efforts following the Japan earthquake and tsunami, Yokohama Rubber reports that as of April 28 Yokohama group companies and their employees had donated a total of approximately 88,500,000 yen (US$1,100,000) to the relief effort. That total includes donations of 61,700,000 yen ($760,000) by Yokohama group companies and their employees in Japan, including a 50,000,000 yen ($610,000) corporate donation by the parent company, and 26,800,000 yen ($330,000) by group companies and their employees in other nations. The companies and employees made their contributions mainly through the Red Cross societies in their nations.

2nd May 2011/by Tyrepress Editors

Nankang employees contribute to Japan disaster aid

Taiwan based tyre maker Nankang Rubber Tire Corp. reports its management and employees raised two million yen (£15,000) for the Japan Red Cross in order to aid victims of the recent earthquake and tsunami. “After the March 11 earthquake hit, our eyes, hearts and browser windows have been trained on Japan,” Nankang commented in a press statement. “As one of global citizens, we just do our responsibility to express our deepest condolences to the suffered people.”

27th April 2011/by Tyrepress Editors