Whether its raw materials, machinery, research and development or the latest manufacturing trends, this tag provides up-to-the-minute insights into the upstream part of the tyre industry.
As a well established, regular exhibitor at the Reifen exhibition, Singapore based Stamford Tyres will once again be using Europe’s most important tyre show to maximum effect. This year it has secured a larger, 100 square metre stand for itself (hall 2, stand 530), and will introduce a new tyre and a new alloy wheel range.
A little-known claim to fame for Charles City, Iowa is that the word “tractor” was first coined there, in 1901. It is therefore fitting that Mitas chose to establish its radial agricultural tyre factory in that particular US town. On 26 April the plant officially opened, with Iowa governor Terry Branstad, Charles City mayor James Erb and Mitas representatives Tomas Nemec and Oldrich Slemr cutting the ribbon to start serial production of agricultural tyres. Upon celebrating the factory’s inauguration, Mitas also announced it would accelerate its US$52 million investment to achieve full plant production capacity of 13,500 tonnes of tyres a year by 2013, three years earlier than originally anticipated.
Following positive experiences at its Mt. Vernon, USA plant, Continental has implemented a ‘Work-in-Process’ (WIP) Visibility solution from AeroScout at its tyre plant in Sarreguemines, France. AeroScout, a specialist in enterprise visibility solutions, first supplied the Wi-Fi RFID-enabled solution to Continental Tire the Americas as part of expansion plans for the Mt. Vernon facility; AeroScout says its product helped enable the site achieve a 20 per cent reduction in component tyre losses. Continental anticipates the French project will increase daily output at Sarreguemines by 4,000 units.
Saab Automobile Parts AB has signed an agreement with the administrators of Saab Automobile AB allowing them the use of Saab’s press and body shop plant, including the specialist tooling, for the manufacture and assembly of body parts. The decision has been welcomed by Saab Parts UK, which said that the restart of in Trollhättan for parts manufacturing would allow parts availability to return to the levels experienced before production was halted. The UK parts supplier has been trading for almost four months, and the company says it continues to grow its network of authorised repairers.
Nissan's factory at Sunderland has been awarded the Queen's Award for continued achievement in International Trade. The Queen's Awards for Enterprise are the UK's most prestigious awards for business performance, recognising and rewarding outstanding achievement by UK based companies.
Knievel Motorcycle Manufacturing Inc., the custom motorcycle brand representing the Robert “Evel” Knievel legacy, has selected Avon Motorcycle Tyres North America as its exclusive tyre supplier. “Our engineering and design teams have vast experience in hand-building quality custom-production motorcycles and are well respected in the motorcycle business,” stated Rob Myers, general manager, Knievel Motorcycle Manufacturing.
Following a run of exhibition involvement in 2011 at Autopromotec (Bologna) and SEMA (Las Vegas), Chinese-produced tyre brand Sailun has decided make its debut at the European industry’s biggest show by exhibiting at the forthcoming Reifen 2012 show. It is also rumoured that a new UHP passenger tyre will be unveiled.
Sibur – Russian Tires has announced that is renaming itself. According to the company, the name-change took effect on 3 April 2012 and new full name Joint Stock Company (or JSC) or just Cordiant for short.
Indian industrial tyre manufacturer, Solidite Industrial Tyres & Systems (P) Ltd, has announced its plans to present its latest range of products at Reifen 2012.
Formed through the collaboration of what the company calls “some of the pioneers of the tyre and rubber industry”, Solidite aims to bring together combined tyre manufacturing experience of more than 100 years. According to the company, the very brand name itself represents the concept of “a true and dedicated elastic solid tyre.”
Brisa, the company producing Lassa brand tyres in a joint venture between Bridgestone and the Sabanci Group, has announced it will invest US$117.5 million expanding its tyre manufacturing units in Izmit, Turkey. The investment figure exceeds the $110 million of investment that was reported at the start of April.
Audi AG has agreed to buy Ducati Motor Holding S.p.A. for a reported £708 million. According to the company, the transaction will be completed “as quickly as possible” once authorized by the competition authorities. Ducati is now a third pillar for Audi AG in Northern Italy alongside Lamborghini and Italdesign. The company sees the move as "another building block in its growth strategy."
Automotive and transport consulting group, CLEAR has shown that there was growth of 58 per cent in heavy trailer demand in Eastern Europe in 2011. Thirteen of the fifteen countries covered in the report had growth of over 30 per cent, while three other markets grew by more than 100 per cent. The stand-out nation was Turkey, which completely recovered from the downturn of 2009 to post record trailer demand in 2010 and 2011, making it the largest trailer market in Eastern Europe.
The greatest environmental impact associated with the tyre life cycle occurs during the tyre’s on-road use, and therefore rolling resistance and the role it plays in fuel consumption is an increasing focus for tyre makers and consumers. Yet important as it may be, rolling resistance is only one of a number of factors that require consideration during the development of a ‘green’ tyre.
Recent growth in European market sales across both the passenger car and radial truck tyre sectors has led to an upgrade of the Sailun’s tyre logistics strategy.
According to the company, in order to meet increased demand and to maintain service level agreements and delivery standards, Sailun has opened a new enhanced warehousing facility next to its Qingdao research, development, testing and manufacturing centre.
According to China’s National Bureau of Statistics, last year the country spent RMB 861 billion (£85.7 billion) on research and development, a figure equal to 1.83 per cent of its gross domestic product. One area of investment was work towards establishing around 100 ‘National Engineering Laboratories’ that will specialise in facilitating innovation in a range of industries. The interests of China’s tyre industry will be served by a dedicated laboratory, and in August 2011 China’s government appointed the Triangle Group the host company for a joint-funded facility, the National Engineering Laboratory for Radial Tire Design and Manufacturing Technologies (NEL). At the Triangle Group’s 2012 Global Automotive and Tire Industry Forum & Business Summit, held in Beijing on 11 April, NEL associate director Harry Gong explained the laboratory’s purpose in greater detail.
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