Avon Tyres has increase production its Cobra motorcycle tyre in response to the successful launch of the new Triumph Bonneville Bobber.
The Cobra tyre is the OE fitment on every Bobber that rolls off the production line, with the bespoke front and rear tyres specially designed for this premium custom bike.
Toyota Motor Europe will invest a further £240 million in its Toyota Manufacturing UK (TMUK) car plant in Burnaston, Derbyshire (UK). According to the company, Toyota’s investment will be spent on improving competitiveness and promoting UK supply chain efficiencies.
For the fifth consecutive year, Yokohama Tire Corporation has earned Caterpillar’s premier supplier award: the Platinum Level Recertification in its Supplier Quality Excellence Process (SQEP). The award went to Yokohama’s factory in Onomichi, Japan, which produces OE and replacement off-the-road (OTR) tyres for a wide range of equipment.
Westlake tyres is supplying global transport and logistics firm DSV with tyres for 3000 commercial vehicle trailers as the sole original equipment fitment. According to Westlake representatives, the latest news comes as part of a strategy for Westlake to expand in the OE market for the fleets in Europe during the coming year.
Not only is Automechanika Birmingham 2017 set to be 70 per cent bigger than last year’s inaugural show, this year’s event seeks to connect the aftermarket with industry and government to support inward investment. Speaking at a press conference in central London on 9 March, Automechanika Birmingham event director Simon Albert and SMMT chief executive shared how they will bring the UK automotive industry together as part of efforts to “boost supply chain reshoring and make British cars more British” while at the same connecting the manufacturing and aftermarket sectors with each other.
UK vehicle manufacturing output has continued to grow over recent
In a deal designed to make PSA Group the second largest carmaker in Europe, the Peugeot-Citreon brand owner has bought GM’s long-term lossmaking Opel and Vauxhall brands and production bases for 2.2 billion euros. This figure includes a joint venture with BNP Paribas on the GM Europe auto financing operations (valuing these transactions at 1.3 billion euros and 0.9 billion, respectively). But what does it mean for the tyre sector?
The West European Trailer Market had the third highest level of new trailer registrations ever, surpassed only by the figures for 2007 and 2008 before the GFC.
However, there, there was a distinct weakening of the market in the second half of the year and Denmark, France, Germany, Italy and Spain were all less buoyant markets at the end of the year than they were in mid-2016.
Hydrogen Mobility Europe (H2ME) – the ambitious multi-country, multi-partner project to demonstrate that hydrogen can support Europe’s future transport demands – today announced that the first 100 fuel cell electric vehicles (FCEVs) deployed by H2ME are now on the road in Germany, France and the UK.
“Following extremely high numbers of bikes registered in December (10,990) the slowdown seen in January was hugely anticipated. Compared with last year’s strong results, this shows a decline of -15.6 per cent which is, surprisingly, reasonable”, said Stephen Latham, Head of the National Motorcycle Dealers Association (NMDA) which represents motorcycle retailers across the UK.
The European car industry boomed in 2016 – with new car registrations for the year totalling 15.14 million units, a 6.5 per cent increase when compared to 2015. This is the second highest volume seen since 2007 when total registrations exceeded 16 million units. In addition, the results also demonstrate that the SUV take-up trend continues to boom. In fact, the switch to SUVs was the clearest car sector trend in 2016. To be precise, the European SUV sector grew 21.4 per cent last year, increasing from 3.2 million units registered in 2015 to 3.9 million last year. In contrast, the traditional segments grew by just 2.2 per cent – 10 times slower!
A Carspring study shows devaluation percentages in each country as well as a depreciation ranking by brand in the UK. The research found that Minis retain the most value, 46.08 per cent after 56000 kilmetres or 34700 miles. At the other end of the spectrum, Toyota are worst with a devaluation rate of 74.59 per cent.
The UK new car market got 2017 the year off to a good start and achieved record levels of registration again January. According to the latest SMMT figures, 174,564 new cars were registered on British roads in January – rising 2.9 per cent to the highest level since 2005.
The latest Equa Air Quality (Aq) Index shows assumptions that two-wheel-drive vehicles are cleaner than four-wheel drives are wrong. Comparing two and four-wheel-drive test results reveals that the more capable models produce less nitrogen oxides when compared through real, on-road driving. Concentrating on the latest Euro 6 compliant vehicles, it shows the vast improvements that some manufacturers have made in helping cut harmful tailpipe emissions when developing new cars.
On 23 January the European Tyre and Rubber Manufacturers’ Association published its members’ sales for the year 2016 and the last quarter of 2016.
Consumer tyres were up 2 per cent in 2016 – despite minor fluctuations during the third quarter and with a strong performance in the last quarter (+4%). OE consumer tyres sales followed the performance of new car registrations, albeit it more slowly, rising 3 per cent.
Last year Kumho products were honoured with the world’s top three design accolades – the Red Dot Award (Germany), iF International Forum Design (Germany), and International Design Excellence Awards (United States). Add further laurels from Good Design (Japan), Good Design (Korea) and Green Good Design (United States), and it was a bumper 12 months.
If you would like the latest news from the Chinese tyre industry in Chinese, visit our partner site TyrepressChina.com. Or click below to continue on Tyrepress.