The Al Dobowi Group has appointed Tom Edwards to the position of European marketing manager. Previously export sales manager at Cooper Tire, managing customer relationships across Scandinavia, Benelux and the Mediterranean, Edwards has ten years of sales and marketing experience.
The Independent Tire Dealers Group (ITDG) has announced its exclusive distribution and marketing of the Diamondback passenger car and light truck tyre brand in the United States. The buying group said it is working in concert with Husky Tire of San Antonio, Texas, which provides logistical support expertise.
The newest addition to the Mitas ERL earthmover tyre range has been unveiled at Bauma 2013. Like other products in the ERL range, the 20.5R25 ERL-50, which will be released globally in July, is intended for use on loaders, dozers and graders operating in rocky conditions. With the addition of the ERL-50, the ERL line-up now covers 12 sizes with tread depths ranging from 28 to 90mm.
Takayuki Hamaya, chief operating officer at Yokohama Tire Corporation, shares that several promotions within the Japanese tyre maker’s North American operation took effect on 1 April.
Changes to the management structure of Pirelli Deutschland’s sales and marketing team took effect on 1 April. Amongst these tweaks is an extension of Sascha Kemper’s area of responsibility. In addition to his current position as Germany-wide sales manager for the original equipment truck business and Northern Germany sales manager for the replacement market truck business, Kemper has taken over as head of the replacement truck business in Southern Germany from Sascha Ihrig.
Bridgestone Americas subsidiary Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations reports that its commercial tyre division has a new vice-president of marketing. As of 1 March this position has been occupied by Matthew Stevenson, who joins the company from Meritor, Inc., where he served as general manager of North American Field Operations and Marketing. Prior to beginning his role with Meritor in 2010, Stevenson spent ten years at Daimler Trucks North America, where he held several positions of increasing responsibility in both sales and marketing.
Yokohama Tire Corporation has announced what it calls key changes to its Consumer Sales division. These changes take effect immediately and include the addition of a new sales zone, along with several organisational changes. On the changes, Dan King, senior vice-president of sales and marketing for the Japanese company’s North American manufacturing and marketing arm, commented that “the geographical reorganisation offers the best utilisation of our resources and moves us closer to our dealers in order to better support them.”
National Motorcycle Dealer Association is the new name for RMI motorcycle division, the trade association representing motorcycle dealers across the UK. Director Sue Robinson commented: "The UK motorcycle industry is evolving and modern motorcycle dealer's needs are changing. In an industry that has been hit hard by the recession it is more important than ever to have the support and guidance of a reputable trade body.
Hankook Tire is tweaking its global management team. Soo Il Lee, who is currently president of Hankook Tire America, will as of 1 January take on the position of president and COO of Hankook’s China regional headquarters. The person he’s replacing, Byeong Jin Lee, has been appointed Soo Il Lee’s successor in the US-based position.
Goodyear Dunlop has announced organisational changes in its ‘German-speaking’ markets. As of 1 February 2013 changes will occur in the leadership structure of the so-called “D-A-CH cluster” (Germany, Austria and Switzerland cluster), the business formed at the start of 2012 from the three respective national operations. The tyre maker says a key element of this will involve the creation of an integrated consumer replacement segment sales and marketing organisation under the leadership of Frank Titz, who is currently director of the D-A-CH consumer replacement business. In his new role, Titz will coordinate the tyre maker’s entire sales and marketing activities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. As before, Titz will report to Dr. Rainer Landwehr, group managing director for the three countries.
In order to further its customers’ knowledge about the battery business, Exide Technologies has launched what it calls ‘Exide Academy’. This new programme covers a broad range of commercial and technical topics, including margin optimisation and start-stop technology.
Richard Rose has been appointed VP of sales and marketing at Titan International, the company’s board of directors announced. The appointment is effective 1 November 2012.
The fact that Tyre Bay Direct’s NitroFill Auto Club was a contender the TAFF Innovation award that was announced during the course of Brityrex week is likely to promote both the nitrogren inflation brand and the “club” concept. Tyre Bay Direct (TBD) may not have won when the awards were announced on Wednesday 10 November, but as the saying goes “all publicity is good publicity.
Tire Group International has hired Bill Hirst its new vice-president of program sales for its domestic division. Hirst, who has been in the tyre industry for more than 33 years, has a background in the passenger, light truck, truck, industrial, agricultural and OTR tyre segments. He most recently served as executive vice president of sales at TBC Corp. Prior to that position, Hirst was vice-president of sales and marketing for Treadways Corp.
Accuride Wheels has unveiled a new proprietary, multi-step, post-production treatment process that texturises, anodises and seals the surface of aluminium wheels. According to the Accuride Corp. subsidiary, this new ‘Accu-Armor’ treatment gives aluminium wheels highly a high level of resistance to scratching and scuffing and filiform corrosion from the high- and low-pH chemicals commonly used in truck washes, and common chemicals used in de-icing road surfaces. Accu-Armor aluminium wheels also are said to be durable under extended exposure to heat and UV light, will not chalk or fade, and are easy to clean.
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