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Workers made redundant in 2009 when Cooper Tire & Rubber Co. closed its plant in Albany, Georgia are back at work with the company, Tire Review reports. According to news from Albany television station WALB-TV, the ex-Albany employees were among a group of temporary workers Cooper hired to operate its Findlay plant.
The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders’ new headquarters in London’s Great Peter Street is hosting a display to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the firm Robert Bosch, which began life in Germany in 1886 under the company name ‘Workshop for Precision Mechanics and Electrical Engineering’ (Werkstätte für Feinmechanik und Elektrotechnik). Bosch says both the vehicles on display and the choice of venue have “particular significance” for the company.
As I write David Cameron has just vetoed Angela Merkel and Nicholas Sarkosy’s proposal for closer fiscal integration between European states. A day earlier Standard and Poor’s put the best part of Europe on credit watch, threatening to downgrade national credit ratings if nothing substantial happened to shore up the collective accounts. The day after the 10-hour long European fiscal integration talks concluded with all but three countries (UK, Sweden and Hungary) signing up to the treaty within a treaty, far from stabilising things, increased Italian bond rates actually made its governmental borrowing more expensive.
On 1 January 2012, Yuji Goto will take over from Hikomitsu Noji as president of Yokohama Rubber’s Tire Group, the Japanese company reports. Goto is already general manager of Yokohama’s Tire Global Business Planning Division, a role he will continue in next year. Hikomitsu Noji will retain his position as president and representative director of Yokohama Rubber.
Toyo’s new tyre plant in China’s Jiangsu Province is officially open. On 8 December Toyo Tire & Rubber held a ceremony to mark the entry of the Toyo Tire (Zhangjiagang) Co. Ltd. passenger car and light truck tyre factory into the company’s global manufacturing network.
Cooper Tire & Rubber has announced its entry into an agreement to acquire the assets of an existing tyre plant in Kruševac, Serbia. Although Cooper’s statement on the deal did not name the Serbian company, the tyre maker’s interest in investing into Kruševac-based firm Trayal has been known since mid-2011. The agreement to acquire Trayal’s passenger car tyre business was signed on 8 December by Hal Miller, president of Cooper's International Tire Segment, and Serbia’s minister of Economy, Nebojša Ćirić.
Brazilian retread material and tyre repair manufacturer Vipal has hosted a course in Europe. The even was run in conjunction with Universidad Miguel Hernández and Asociación Española de Neumáticos Reciclados (the Spanish recycled tyres association).
One of the objectives of the inaugural course in Elche, Spain, was to provide participants with a general overview of the techniques involved in recycling tyres, with a particular focus on common problems and methods for avoiding them. Held at the end of October, this event launched activities that are part of the course entitled “Research and Training regarding Recycling Tyres” that has become part of the Mechanical Engineering degree offered by the University.
In the last couple of weeks the tyrepress.com website has published a number of texts updating the progress, or lack thereof, of negotiations between Cooper Tire & Rubber and the United Steelworkers towards a new contract for Cooper’s Findlay, Ohio plant. The current standoff between union and tyre maker is not the first Tyres & Accessories has reported, and is certain not to be the last. Yet some think what is happening in Findlay shows the direction US labour relations are taking; the Wall Street Journal, for example, opines that “the clash between Cooper and its 1,050 union workers may signal a return to a more combative tone in the America's industrial heartland.”
Through its “Forever Forest” programme, Yokohama Rubber and its subsidiaries aim to create verdant surroundings at Yokohama facilities around the world; the intention is to plant more than half a million trees by 2017, a goal Yokohama is almost halfway towards achieving. The company’s US tyre operation, Yokohama Tire Corporation launched the second phase of its Forever Forest activities on 7 December with the planting of more than 300 seedlings at its headquarters. This second phase planting in Fullerton, California followed the inaugural event held in December 2010 when Yokohama Tire Corporation planted more than 500 tree seedlings.
US-based company Koppers Holdings Inc. has announced the end of manufacturing at its Continental Carbon Australia plant in Kurnell, just south of Sydney. The carbon black facility is scheduled to end operations during the week of 5 December 2011 and preparations for closing the plant will be made over the coming four months. Koppers says the decision, which will affect approximately 65 employees, was taken as a result of an analysis of its manufacturing facilities; this highlighted a number of negative factors working against the Continental Carbon Australia plant, including the strong Australian dollar and raw material availability and cost.
On 6 December the United Steelworkers International union and its Findlay, Ohio branch, Local 207L, filed charges against Cooper Tire & Rubber with US government agency the National Labor Relations Board. The charges allege Cooper Tire committed “unfair labour practices in bargaining and imposing a lockout” at its Findlay tyre plant, the USW reports.
Goodyear Tire & Rubber’s directors have declared a quarterly dividend of 73.44 cents per share of mandatory convertible preferred stock. The dividend is payable 1 January 2012, to shareholders of record on 15 December 2011. The payout represents an annual rate of US$2.9375 per share, the tyre maker comments.
US news sources report Cooper Tire & Rubber has brought in temporary workers to operate its Findlay, Ohio factory. Union member employees have been locked out of the plant since 29 November and local television station WTOL says temporary factory workers were driven in vans into the plant past picketing union workers on 5 December.
Norfolk-based tyre business TYM International has secured its continuing relationship with leading Chinese tyre manufacturer Triangle Tyres. The deal was sealed following meetings between TYM International general manager Steve Eke and Triangle senior vice president and international export director Lin Bin at the manufacturer’s Weihai, Shandong Province headquarters at the end of November. Furthering a relationship that first began in 2004, the agreement sees the two companies aim to develop their growing mutual business in the UK earthmover, truck and passenger car tyre segments.
The Rubber Manufacturers Association, which represents the manufacturers accountable for more than 90 per cent of all US tyre shipments, has lowered its 2011 tyre shipment forecast by one per cent due to downward revisions in year-end economic growth in the US. This revised full-year forecast of 287 million total units is approximately two million units more than in 2010. For next year, the RMA retains a “guardedly optimistic” forecast as US economic growth is anticipated to remain slow, and the association expects overall tyre shipments in 2012 to increase by more than two per cent to over 290 million total units.
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