As of February 15 the role of senior vice president at Continental Corporation’s Corporate Communications department will be handled by Dr. Felix Gress. The 49-year old comes to Conti from Metropolregion Rhein-Neckar GmbH, where he served as managing director, and succeeds Dr. Heimo Prokop, who left Continental on December 31, 2009. In his new position, Gress will report directly to Conti Executive Board chairman Dr. Elmar Degenhart.
County Louth, Ireland-based Crumb Rubber has highlighted what one report called the “inadequate state of recycling of tyres in Ireland.” Irish Trucker News quoted Leo Kerley of Crumb Rubber as saying a massive 29,000 tonnes of tyres are not being recycled in the republic annually. Kerley pointed out that approximately 6,000 tonnes of tyres are recycled on a yearly basis in Ireland. The inability of policing waste laws has reportedly left thousand of tonnes of tyre being stockpiled throughout the country.
Staff at a Kwik-Fit centre in York recently discovered they had been working under a cannabis growing factory. Unbeknownst to them 387 cannabis plants with a street value of up to £46,000 had been growing in the space above the branch in York. According to a report in the Yorkshire Post, workers only made the surprising discovery when water leaked through the ceiling and they went up to investigate the damage. The news made the papers today (29 January) after Vietnamese illegal immigrant Duc Van Tran, an illegal immigrant from Vietnam admitted conspiracy to produce cannabis in a case at Leeds Crown Court. Tran has been jailed for 20 months.
When Tyres & Accessories was invited to attend TIF’s Electronic Data Interchange Wheel (EDIWheel for short) seminar in December, the magazine was pleased to attend and report on the discussions that took place for the benefit of the wider tyre industry. Following our report in the January issue of the magazine, it appears that our coverage has been something of a catalyst to the discussion of this issue within the various parts of the industry.
The preliminary national data on miles traveled in November is good news for the aftermarket, according to the Automotive Aftermarket Suppliers Association (AASA). November mileage reported an uptick following a dismal October, when the string of year-over-year positive monthly mileage reports for 2009 ended, according to the Federal Highway Administration of the U.S. Department of Transportation.
In the USA, the Tire Industry Association recently stepped forward when an attempt was made to mandate retread safety standards equivalent to the new tyre standards in a motorcoach safety bill, reports Tire Review. Senate bill S. 554, introduced by senators Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH), contained the following paragraph:
Creditors have reportedly named PricewaterhouseCoopers Korea and Deloitte Anjin LLC as the firms carrying out due diligence on Kumho Tire and Kumho Industrial. The accounting firms may take about two months two deliver reports, however creditors have decided to conclude the process earlier than previously planned to speed up the normalisation of the two Kumho Asiana business units.
Following VOSA’s decision to publish MOT test failure data last week, the BBC is reporting details of a similar report from German motor testing authority TUV. While VOSA was pushed into publishing the failure information for the first time on the 11 January 2010 after a Freedom of Information (FoI) request made by the BBC, over in Deutschland the TUV data is said to have become so popular that the authorities are considering translating it into English.
Irans’s Industrial Development and Renovation Organization (IDRO) has reportedly earmarked $440 million dollars for the construction of a tyre factory in the country’s western Kordestan province. According to a report in the Tehran Times, the goal ultimate goal is for Iran to become self-sufficient in terms of tyre production.
German motoring magazine Auto Motor und Sport has published coverage of the planned savings in Formula 1, which includes suggestions that Korean tyre manufacturers are interested in supplying the series. At the same time, the magazine reports that while Bridgestone has officially announced it will step back from F1 at the end of the 2010 series, the FIA could be seeking to tempt the tyre maker back with plans to keep costs down by limiting the number of tyres per race weekend to 10 from its current level of fourteen.
While no names are mentioned in the report, speculation that two Korean tyre manufacturers are interested in supplying F1 is likely to refer to Hankook and Korea. Nevertheless, in opinion of the magazine, a 2011 start for one of the Korean tyremakers would be "technically too early”, hence the Bridgestone option.
On 1 January 2010 producers of industrial and automotive batteries will be required to arrange the collection, treatment and recycling of such batteries, free of charge, if requested by business end-users and final holders. Key elements of the new regulations include: Requiring any persons placing batteries on the market to register as a producer of batteries, and report on waste batteries collected and sent for recycling
The Waste Batteries and Accumulators Regulations 2009 complement the existing Batteries and Accumulators (Placing on the Market) regulations 2008, which set out the requirements for introducing new batteries onto the market from 26 September last year. These regulations also introduce a ban on the landfill disposal or incineration of waste industrial and automotive batteries.
Belgium’s Bekaert reports with pride that its CEO, Bert De Graeve, has been voted the country’s Manager of the Year by a jury panel made up of industry and academic specialists. Commenting on the jury’s report, the steel cord manufacturer notes that De Graeve is “praised for his strong leadership skills with which he guided Bekaert through a crisis year and his pro-active management and entrepreneurship which added to the company’s resilience.” Other qualities specifically singled out, Bekaert adds, were De Graeve’s “future-oriented approach focusing on innovation and internationalisation, the sustainability demonstrated in his work and the societal role he takes up in his function as CEO.”
Assuming foreign exchange rates remain stable, the sky-rocketing natural rubber price means the tyre industry will have to increase selling price by 3-4% to offset this raw material. That’s the view of Deutsche Bank analysts who report in a recent investors note that the natural rubber price has doubled over the last 12 months from US$1.5/kg to US$3.0/kg (RSS3 grade). “This increase will have a four to six months lag effect on tyre companies’ profit and loss…So far, we have no reason to be worried since…end market volumes are recovering (especially on passenger car tyres…inventories at dealers are low (sell in markets have been worse than sell out markets),” they analysts explained.
December’s Automechanika Shanghai exhibition attracted more exhibitors and visitors than ever, its organisers report. Between December 9 and 11 the fifth Automechanika show staged in Shanghai was home to 2,414 exhibitors, 22 per cent more than in 2008, and visitor numbers leapt 25 per cent to 38,551, with visitors from 132 countries present at the Shanghai New International Expo Centre. International visitors represented 29 per cent of the total attendance figure, compared to 16 per cent at the previous show.
The US recently imposed tariffs aimed at preventing Chinese manufacturers from dumping cheap tyres in the market, and now China faces its own dumping problems of a different nature – customs officials there report seizing more than 8,500 tonnes of smuggled waste tyres sent from the US. According to the General Administration of Customs, some 366 shipping containers filled with tyres arrived in the coastal city of Guangzhou via Hong Kong between December 2008 and February 2009, where they remained until their discovery in December 2009. Three suspected smugglers were subsequently arrested.
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