Pirelli Archives - Page 197 of 210 - Tyrepress

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.

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Pirelli reports 2003 year end results

The Pirelli Group has announced preliminary results for 2003 showing group revenues at 6,679 million Euro, down 0.6 per cent on the previous year’s 6,718 million Euro revenue. However, this still represented a growth of 7.2 per cent given comparable conditions. The operating income (EBIT) more than doubled to 266 million Euro and the Net debt was reduced to 1,755 million Euro, down by 300 million from the previous year. Overall the industrial operations staff numbers were reduced from 35,247 to 33,401 in 2003. Tyre sector sales accounted for 2,965 million Euro, an increase of 11.4 per cent; 7 per cent due to increased volume, the balance on prices and mix. Operating income from the tyre operation was 220 million Euro, an improvement of 15 per cent on the 2002 figure.

23rd February 2004/by Tyrepress Editors

UK Agricultural Tyre market: a steady decline but still good business

The Agricultural tyre sector in the UK has had a tough year. It began with the aftermath of Foot and Mouth. There was an extremely wet start to the year. Then a prolonged dry period – the driest – if not the hottest – in 25 years.

Wet weather usually means more sales for the agricultural sector, but too much rain just stops the market in its tracks – no pun intended. That was the case early in the year. When the weather turned dry the public lapped up the sunshine and the long dry spell, but farmers anticipating the traditional UK summer were faced with their own dry weather difficulties.

However, tyres and traction were not amongst their troubles. Dry fields do not create traction problems and the agriculture sector stretched the mileage of existing tyres well beyond their expected lifespan. The result has been a drop in the overall market of something around 10 per cent.

The wider agricultural market is dominated by Michelin, Goodyear, Continental and Bridgestone in the UK – with the big players accounting for around 60 per cent of the market. Although just how big the market is no-one can say. That 60 per cent represents almost two thirds of the premium brand tyre market. It does not include the figures of the budget brand sector. As with the car and truck sectors there is no hard evidence to confirm the sales figures at the bottom end of the market. Asking tyre companies about market share results in a sum that is greater than the whole. But general consensus places Michelin group at the head of the market, followed by Goodyear Dunlop, then Continental and Bridgestone followed by Trelleborg/Pirelli and Vredestein.

In order to sell tyres it is, in every sector, important to know who, or what, the customer is and what is being sought. It might be a fair assumption to say that the farmer expects tyres to do the job they are asked to do. That, in itself, is open to interpretation. The contractor may be keeping an eye on the slip meter in the cab and be watching for the point of diminishing returns from a set of tyres; changing them at the point when they become inefficient for his purposes. Another farmer using the same tyres may take a different approach, saying that so long as they hold air they will stay on the tractor. Somewhere in-between there are those who only change tyres when they are damaged beyond repair – they may change the tractor at the same time as the tyres. In marketing tyres to the top end of the agricultural sector though, there must be an assumption made that the people prepared to pay the premium price for a leading brand tyre must have some concept of tyre management and an eye on productivity and efficiency.

28th January 2004/by Tyrepress Editors

Pirelli buys back from Cisco 10% of Submarine Telecom Systems

Pirelli bought back from Cisco Systems the 10% stake of Pirelli Submarine Telecom Systems sold in 2000 for an amount of approx. 75 million dollars. The operation was completed after Cisco Systems exercised its option – stated in the agreements signed on 3 August 2000 – to sell such stake to Pirelli for the same amount. After this operation, Pirelli fully owns Pirelli Submarine Telecom Systems.

13th January 2004/by Tyrepress Editors

Michelin and Pirelli to enter OE contracts

At the Detroit Auto Show the Michelin and Pirelli have both announced new OE contracts with Ford. Michelin will deliver the BFGoodrich g-Force T/A KDW (18 inch) and BFGoodrich all-season Traction T/A (16 inch) to equip Ford’s Mustang GT. Pirelli Tire North America will also deliver tyres for the new Mustang GT, namely the P Zero Nero. For the new Mercury Montego, the Ford Focus ST, and the Ford Freestyle Pirelli will deliver its P6 Four Season tyre into Ford’s OE.

12th January 2004/by Tyrepress Editors

Kumho’s latest tyre plant with automated production

Kumho Tires Ltd. has completed construction of a tyre plant equipped with an automated production unit in Pyeongtaek, south of Seoul. The company is the first Korean tyre maker to have the automated system that so far is used by only the five top tyre companies around the world – Michelin, Bridgestone, Goodyear, Continental and Pirelli. Kumho said the automated production unit combines nine stages of tyre production, cutting the length of the production line from 1.2 kilometers to 800 metres. About 100 billion won (84 million US dollars) was spent on the construction over the past two years and four months. The new factory can produce 6,000 tyres per day, with annual production capacity expected at 2 million. The company’s total annual production now is 36.6 million tyres.

12th January 2004/by Tyrepress Editors

Pirelli awarded 60 million Euros contract in the Energy sector

Pirelli has been awarded a contract for realizing – for Moroccan power company L’Office National de l’Electricité and Spanish Red Electrica de Espana – a high voltage submarine link that will interconnect Spanish and Moroccan power grids across the Gibraltar Strait and is worth 60 million Euros. This contract confirms Pirelli’s leadership and technological excellence in the Energy Cables and Systems sector and is the most important for submarine power industry in 2003. The whole contract, which is worth 115 million Euros, was awarded to a consortium, whose components are Pirelli and Nexans. Pirelli will manufacture and install with its own cable ship Giulio Verne two submarine power cables and one telecommunication cable. Submarine cables will be manufactured in the next two years at Italian plant in Arco Felice (Neaples), the world’s most advanced excellence centre for submarine applications of Pirelli Group.

16th December 2003/by Tyrepress Editors

Indian Tyre industry missing opportunity

India’s outsourcing boom is likely to have little impact on the tyre industry that has huge potential. The tyre industry needs to source rubber at global prices. Availability of rubber at par with international majors like Continental, Pirelli or Yokohama would lead to development of India as a base for manufacturing, according to Anil Sampat, an industry analyst and former rubber industry insider. India’s largest player MRF is still one fifth in size of global companies. The only way the Indian tyre industry can grow and reach global scale is to attract investments from international tyre majors as the industry is capital intensive. The small size of Indian companies is a source of worry, says Sampat. With tyre industry expected to grow only by 2 per cent, “real growth can come only when India offers world class manufacturing facilities for global players,” he points out.

11th December 2003/by Tyrepress Editors

Pirelli takes up the challenges in the United States

Although the results of the Pirelli group have improved during the first nine months of this year, it is the tyre business that really shines. What was taunted by analysts as the “old economy” two years ago now represents the pearl of the company. That tyres participate in the company’s turnover with “only” around 45 per cent, but with an EBIT of 174 million Euro for the first nine months in the face of expected 194 million EBIT for the company as a whole says it all. As in previous years Pirelli’s General Manager Tyres Francesco Gori travelled to Las Vegas in order to deepen contacts to the market, from which the Italian tyre manufacturer still expects a lot in the future.

On the largest tyre market of the world, the USA, Pirelli was not very lucky during the last 20 years. From all of this nothing is left. There is nothing in common and the two keep out of each others’ way. Nevertheless, Pirelli did not give up the US market. After the MIRS factory started in Rome/Georgia earlier this year, ever more strongly, the Italians will generate a turnover of approximately 250 million Euro this year with American customers and for the second time in a row will end a financial year in Northern America with a profit. This is all the more remarkable as that the initial costs of the MIRS factory are to be borne. This time Pirelli is taking the difficult and time-consuming route into the market via the OE manufacturers. But a glance on Pirelli’s OE business, which shines with high growth rates, is worth while: here Pirelli proceeds rather selectively; anyway, the Italians do not supply bread and butter tyres with weak margins. On the one hand it concerns high-quality ultra high performance and expensive Off-Road tyres, which are manufactured in Rome, and on the other hand the company supplies tyres from the Brazilian factories into the American original equipment to customers such as Ford and Chrysler. Beginning next year, Gori says, a considerable volume will also come from the newly built Brazilian tyre factory in Salvador (Feira de Santana, Bahia). This factory is considered as particularly efficient and economical, so that the OE business in Northern America might be good fun not only under volume criteria, but will be profitable as well. And concerning sales prospects Pirelli shouldn’t have any real worries, because right now there are dozens of dimensions that are homologated with General Motors, these will be followed by orders. Thus the growth in the North American OE market will continue.

However, also on the American replacement market Gori has set himself and his staff ambitious goals. According to Gori the tyre manufacturer succeeded in finding new dealers, that were interested in Pirelli, and these in sufficient numbers. Tyre dealers observe the market very closely and notice quickly, in which direction trends go and with whom they should form a coalition, in line with Gori’s perception. The good position within the OE business, in addition with predominantly high-quality tyres, let Pirelli become ever more a valuable partner for the replacement business. In the last few years Pirelli grew in North America annually by almost 20 per cent and this is what Gori wants to realise for the coming years, too. However, with all optimism Gori refers to the extremely hard competition in North America, where each manufacturer wants to maintain ground. Pirelli could improve drastically all services, delivery speed, etc., and even concerning the prices the tyre manufacturer was able to position the brand better than last year. “But,” acknowledges Gori, “we are still far away from what we want and what we have to reach.”

North America is the big challenge for Pirelli, here the Italians find larger growth prospects even over years, which must be exhausted. The termination of the co-operation with Cooper was in reality, at least it looks that way today, a completely new beginning in Northern America. Concerning the costs of distribution and services over the whole of the continent, Gori calms down: there was no problem, everything is on schedule.

10th December 2003/by Tyrepress Editors

Continental struggles for turn-around on North American tyre market

Earlier this year it was clear that the CTNA (Continental Tires North America, previously General Tire) would again have to report a three-figure million loss. In the meantime it seeped through that this number is closer to 150 million Euro than “only” around 100 million Euro. This frighteningly high loss shows: In the European tyre business the company makes huge earnings and if the American losses have finally come to an end, the tyre section is not just strongest in turn-over (despite the expected next year’s higher growth in the Automotive business unit), but also the yield-strongest. Tyres still have good expectations in the company; among other things this assumption was underpinned by the majority purchase of the tyre business of the Malaysian company Sime Darby Berhad with two tyre factories with an already existing production capacity of four million passenger car, one million small truck as well as 300,000 heavy truck tyres.

Talking to T&A at the SEMA Show in Las Vegas, Manfred Wennemer (55) and Martien de Louw (57), who is responsible for Continental’s passenger car tyre unit as well as CTNA, affirmed that the American tyre business will reach break-even by the end of 2005. Wennemer specifies: “With the CTNA we will reach break-even in the last quarter of 2005 even though naturally we would be pleased, if we could reach it even earlier.”

Continental was not represented at the SEMA show with its own stand, unlike Bridgestone/ Firestone, Cooper, Goodyear, Michelin and Pirelli and other competitors, probably a cost-based decision. All too tragically this might not have been, because more important than meetings in the company’s booths at the show are meetings accompanying the SEMA show in the surrounding luxury hotels of the craziest city of the world. Martien de Louw and his executive team had invited the customers to an evening in the Mandalay Bay hotel, where hundreds of Continental’s “Best Friends” arrived. De Louw used this opportunity to present his complete executive team. Manfred Wennemer, who travelled to Las Vegas, too, was accessible “on the floor” for everyone, without pushing his colleague de Louw into the background. Optimism was noticeable in Las Vegas; but in order to see that the distance remaining to be covered remains rough and stony, requires no clairvoyance.

10th December 2003/by Tyrepress Editors

SEMA Show 2003 in Las Vegas

Approximately 90,000 visitors were expected to the 37th SEMA exhibition in Las Vegas according to organiser Specialty Equipment Market Association, without exception specialised public. The annual fair, that usually takes place in November, is comparable with the German Automechanika. For the past decade the tyre sector has been a very important part of the Show. All the tyre manufacturers with interest in the American tyre market are present in Las Vegas. Visitors however shouldn’t expect the presentation of groundbreaking new products. On the contrary: Las Vegas is a suitable place, at which business relations between customers and suppliers can be established or deepened. Despite all the economic difficulties the world’s gambling capital, in the desert of Nevada, is booming. And “9/11” seems to have passed this city without trace, a city which still builds one fancy hotel next to another. The Hilton hotel in Las Vegas it is adjacent to the fairground, once the largest hotel in the world with approximately 3,500 rooms, is nowadays less significant. Others have 4,000, 5,000 or even more rooms. Reportedly a hotel with 8,000 rooms is to be built shortly. At present the city waits for the opening of another luxury hotel, which is to dominate not only by size, but also by luxury. The opening is due in two years. To be on the safe side, the planned French name for the hotel was axed, because it is feared that too many patriotic Americans would avoid such a hotel, after the Gauls dared not to take part in the Iraqi war.

The tyre exhibition in Las Vegas is surely still a meeting of trade specialists. One enters the halls, looks to the left and to the right into the vast array of different exhibition booths. Nevertheless, any visitor has toured every booth within a short time. Although tyre manufacturers such as Bridgestone, Goodyear, Michelin, Cooper, Pirelli, Hankook, Kumho, Yokohama and others are present, the important decisions are not taken at the show. The pricipal discussions take place in the hotels. There the life pulsates. There the receptions take place. There, tyre dealers are invited to meet with their suppliers to specify commercial objectives for the coming year. The large tyre manufacturers not only offer product, but also various kinds of marketing and sales promotion programs. It is the tyre manufacturers aim to bring partners into line in order to improve their new tyre business by at least 50 per cent.

10th December 2003/by Tyrepress Editors

Ceat to increase Pirelli imports

Indian company Ceat is poised to treble imports of Pirelli radials to 15,000 tyres a month. Ceat claims a six per cent share of the radial tyre sector and is aiming to increase this to 10 per cent in the near future.

10th December 2003/by Tyrepress Editors

Homologation for the Pirelli P 7 on the Volvo V50

The Volvo V50 making its world debut at the Bologna Motor Show is the most recent testimonial to the fourth generation of the high performance Pirelli P7 range. This latest version of the tyre is designed to provide luxury saloons and station wagons with a perfect blend of performance and driving comfort.

5th December 2003/by Tyrepress Editors

Pirelli Calendar 2004 overshadowed by events in Iraq

Whilst presenting the new Pirelli Calendar 2004 in London yesterday evening, Pirelli’s chairman and CEO Marco Tronchetti Provera asked the guests for a minute’s silence in commemoration of the victims from a bomb attack on an Italian military base in Iraq in which 15 Italian soldiers and others were killed. The new 2004 Calendar that was then presented by photographer Nick Knight and art director Peter Saville, takes getting used to. Star model of the evening was undoubtedly the Sudanese Alek Wek, who enjoys large reputation also because of various social commitments.

13th November 2003/by Tyrepress Editors

Solberg is World Rally Champion

Norway’s Petter Solberg was crowned World Rally Champion after winning the Wales Rally in his Pirelli-shod Subaru Impreza. He finished ahead of Sebastien Loeb, who was under orders from Citroen to make sure that he finished safely, in order that Michelin-shod Citroen could capture the Manufacturer’s title in their first full year. In the end, Loeb came second, over 42 seconds behind Solberg, to take second place in the WRC. Carlos Sainz (Citroen) took third place in the overall drivers’ championship.

10th November 2003/by Tyrepress Editors

Pirelli is on schedule

For Pirelli the current year is on schedule in the face of good sales and earnings. Higher prices for raw materials won’t burden Pirelli’s results before the new year. Talking to TYRES & ACCESSORIES at the SEMA show in Las Vegas, Dr. Francesco Gori, Managing Director of the Pirelli Tyre Sector, again affirms the good business in the USA. For the second time in a row Pirelli will end a year making a profit on the biggest tyre market in the world. This is even more remarkable, because Pirelli has just opened its MIRS-plant in Rome, Georgia, for which the company has incurred launch costs. During the last years the Italian company was pleased with an annual sales growth of about 20 per cent. This was partly because of the OE business Pirelli undertakes with car makers Ford and Chrysler. But not only that, the tyre maker has gained ground also on the replacement market after the sell-out through mass merchandisers has been stopped. In Latin America Gori expects Pirelli to be clearly number one ahead of Goodyear, whose Mexican activities structurally belong to the North American business (Nafta). The prospects are rather good that Pirelli will generate sales of more than 3 billion euro during this year solely with tyres; during last year this economic indicator stood at 2.857 billion euro. Exact figures concerning third quarter performance will be published on November 11.

6th November 2003/by Tyrepress Editors