Known for its style, speed and performance marketing values, Pirelli & C. S.p.A. is a multinational company based in Milan, Italy, listed on the Milan Stock Exchange since 1922, with a temporary privatization period by the consortium led by the Chinese state-owned enterprise ChemChina.
The Pirelli P Zero has taken top honours in Evo magazine’s annual tyre test. The Pirelli tyre and its rivals from Continental, Dunlop, Goodyear, Hankook, Kumho, Michelin, Nexen and Vredestein were put through their paces on a circuit in the south of France, where wet handling, dry handling, braking and aquaplaning were assessed, followed by a drive on a mixed road route designed to replicate real world conditions.
Pirelli has chosen its Carlisle plant as the research and development centre for a new range of eco tyres. The manufacturer said the experience and expertise at Pirelli Carlisle, operational since the 1960s, was a key factor in its decision to stage the development of the next generation of high technology Pirelli green tyres there. The company was recently awarded £2 million from the UK’s Regional Growth Fund, and since being selected as the recipient of the award, Pirelli has announced a further £11.4m investment in the eco tyres project together with a further £9m in new process machinery for volume production. It is estimated that the total investment will create 37 new jobs. On a recent visit to Pirelli’s Carlisle facility, Tyres & Accessories reported the company’s “100 per cent premium” strategy for the site, while also pointing to the likelihood of subsequent private investment implied by the Regional Growth Fund award’s terms. Now Pirelli has confirmed the increased investment to focus on green tyres in Carlisle.
In American advice magazine, Consumer Reports’ latest tests of all-season and winter replacement tyres, Michelin and Continental lead the way, Tire Review reports. However, the results show that many tyres offer good overall performance. In total, CR tested 78 models of all-season and winter tyres: 20 T speed rated all-season tyres; 20 H speed rated and 22 V speed rated performance all-season tyres; and 16 winter tyre models.
With two new winter tyres for 2012, Pirelli is enthusiastically promoting the benefits of fitting specialist cold weather tyres in the UK. Joining the Italian manufacturer’s Sottozero Serie II high performance winter tyre are the recently introduced Winter SnowcontrolSerie 3, designed for smaller cars, and the Scorpion Winter SUV tyre, which was displayed at Reifen 2012, and replaces the Scorpion Ice.
The winners of a silent auction enjoyed a trip to the Formula One in Monza last weekend where the prize winners received paddock passes and hospitality courtesy of Italian tyre firm Pirelli. The auction was held in July at Evolution in Battersea as part of Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity’s annual Formula One party. Pirelli donated two paddock passes to the individual who placed the highest bid on the night.
World Rally Championship tyre supplier, Dmack is rolling out its passenger car and commercial tyre ranges this year, and the brand has received something of a boost in becoming one of the first Chinese tyre manufacturers to achieve an A rating in wet grip for one of its passenger car tyre products. Manufactured by Shandong Yongtai and designed and developed from the brand’s base in the north-west of England, the brand says it has achieved the rating with a concept version of its Kinetic S high performance tyre, which was launched in May this year. Dmack said the concept version of the tyre has been produced “to demonstrate the high levels of expertise that lie within the business”.
Guglielmo Fiocchi has left Pirelli for another Italian automotive supplier, Sogefi SpA, which has appointed him as general manager of the company. Fiocchi, who is 49, graduated in aeronautical engineering from the Milan Politecnico and brings long term experience in the automotive component sector.
Lewis Hamilton recorded McLaren’s third consecutive win this year at the Italian Grand Prix, adopting a one-stop strategy to claim victory from Sauber’s Sergio Perez, who started from 12th on the grid, and used a different one-stop strategy to dazzling effect. Pirelli’s P Zero Silver hard tyre and P Zero White medium were the compounds available at Monza, and the two hardest tyres in the Formula One range showed good performance and durability. Hamilton ran 30 laps on the hard tyre at the end of the race, while the speed of the medium tyre – which Perez used for his 24-lap final stint – enabled him to lap more than two seconds faster than his closest rivals at one point.
Pirelli has launched a new initiative in collaboration with its Pirelli Performance Centres (PPCs). Open to those purchasing two or more premium Pirelli tyres, customers will be entered into a prize draw to win a grandstand ticket for next year’s British Grand Prix, as well as a tour of Red Bull Racing in Milton Keynes and exclusive Pirelli clothing. The promotion runs at the UK and Ireland’s 85 PPCs throughout the months of September and October.
The Italian Grand Prix takes place this weekend (7-9 September, 2012) in Monza, following swiftly behind the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa, and Pirelli returns to its home nation with the same P Zero White and Silver tyres it used in the previous meeting. Monza is the fastest circuit on the Formula One calendar, and puts similarly high energy loading through the tyres as at Spa. Pirelli, which knows the circuit well since the Autodromo Nazionale is situated half an hour’s drive from the company’s Milan headquarters. Pirelli highlights the first chicane, characterised by heavy downhill braking; the Ascari curves, with their several rapid direction changes; and the famous Parabolica, a wide, open radius corner that puts a lot of lateral stress through the tyres as being the most challenging areas for its rubber. Pirelli says these sections, coupled with some of the season’s fastest straights, mean tyre temperatures can peak at up to 130°C and choosing the right tyre for the conditions will be important.
While no-one in the tyre industry claims to have bypassed the combined effects of the credit crunch, euro-crisis and the consequent recession(s), it is fair to say that these economic phenomena have had particularly marked effects on the commercial vehicle tyre market. First of all, as a direct result of customer demand scaling back, truck makers cut down on vehicle production, with the tyre manufacturers responsible for supplying these OEMs forced to follow suit. As fleets responded to falling demand for their services and extended the life of their tyres as far as possible (as well laying up trailers and cannibalising tyres whenever they could), what began as a demand shock in the OE side of the business developed into a replacement slump as well.
Pirelli has upgraded its Apple and Android Diablo Super Biker app, allowing routes travelled to be downloaded and viewed directly on computers and tablets. This, the company says, will make it easy to compare them and facilitate sharing on social networks. The upgrade represents a continuation of the company’s digital and social media strategy. The app has been downloaded more than 100,000 times, averaging 328 downloads per day in the last two months, the company says. The Pirelli Moto Facebook page, launched at the beginning of 2012, has grown to more than 140,000 fans. The Italian manufacturer believes increased social networking leads to greater proactive interaction from customers and end-users on a daily basis.
McLaren’s Jenson Button completed a dominant weekend to win the Belgian Grand Prix. Only second-placed Sebastian Vettel could match the Briton’s ability to look after his tyres, using an almost identical one-stop strategy – medium compound P Zero White tyres, changed to hard compound P Zero Silvers just before the midway point – to finish 13 seconds behind Button, who led from start to finish. This was the first race at which a driver has achieved this in 2012 While Button’s imperious drive would have taken some beating, Vettel’s ascent from tenth on the grid was aided by a spectacular smash involving Championship leader Fernando Alonso and McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton at the first corner, over which Lotus’s Romain Grosjean has been handed a one-race ban.
The route between Pirelli’s UK facilities in Burton-on-Trent and Carlisle is well trodden by Derby-based haulier ATL, and the company has just put three of its newest vehicle acquisitions to work on the company’s most arduous contract. The Mercedes-Benz Axor 2543 tractor units are consistently fully laden and rack up 8,600km a week carrying raw materials and finished tyres between Pirelli’s locations.
Riders competing in the 2013 Australian Superbike Championships will have the choice of racing on Pirelli, Michelin or Dunlop tyres as series organiser, International Entertainment Group (IEG), has decided to end the practice of using a control tyre for all but one competition class. IEG will also place a cap on the number of tyres that can be used and the price of tyres, a measure it says will ensure costs are kept to a minimum for all participants.
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