Toyo Tire Corporation has appointed Masaomi Kono division general manager of its Europe, Africa & Middle East sales division and also, confusingly, general manager of said division, as well as general manager of the Europe, Africa & Middle East sales department. Kono begins in these roles, and presumably will receive slightly larger business cards, on 1 April 2023.
Toyo Tires has confirmed that its Indija, Serbia plant is using a “Taiyo (太陽)” solar energy array that is designed to eliminate 200,000 tonnes of CO2 over its working life.
This year began with the sad news that Ken Block passed away after a snowmobile accident on 2 January. The world-renowned rally driver served as brand ambassador for Toyo Tire Group for the past seven years, and the tyre maker has published a memorial message paying tribute to Block and his accomplishments.
Toyo Tires is at the peak of sponsorship PDC World Darts Championship. The best players in the world are currently battling it out for £2.5 million in prize money at the Alexandra Palace from 15 December to 3 January. Former tyre-fitter Peter Wright is the defending champion but the likes of Michael van Gerwen and Gerwyn Price are determined to take his crown and the £500,000 first prize.
Following the news that Toyo Tire officially opened its Serbia tyre production plant on 14 December 2022, details of the speeches given by Toyo Tire president and CEO Takashi Shimizu as well as Republic of Serbia president Aleksandar Vučić have been revealed.
On November 29, Toyo Tires issued a notice on its official Chinese website saying it will resume using the old Chinese brand name in the mainland market from 1 December. Both the old and new brand names are the Chinese translation of “Toyo Tires”. Toyo previously used this brand name in the Chinese market before 2015, subsequently changing its name to use the Chinese pronunciation of Toyo Tires to determine the new version of the brand and the company name.
June and July saw a spate of factory investment and opening announcements. First there’s the news that Linglong manufactured its first tyre at its brand-new Serbia tyre production plant at the end of June. Of course, this project has been underway for some time, but the fact that it got going just before the end of the first half of 2022 is noteworthy for two reasons. Firstly, notwithstanding the inhibiting effect of general market headwinds associated with pandemic fall-out and war in Ukraine, the project is basically on-schedule. And secondly, it demonstrates that no enthusiasm for Western and specifically European tyre production has been lost since the nullification of European import tariffs against Chinese-produced truck tyres roughly a month ago.
Toyo Tire Corporation achieved a 20 per cent year-on-year increase in net sales in the first half of 2022, with the total rising to 223,667 million yen (£1.373 billion; 1.626 billion euros). At the same time, operating income came in at 25,972 million yen (£160 million; 189 million euros) in the first half of 2022. Both figures outperformed the companies first-half 2022 forecasts.
Toyo Tire’s Serbia car tyre production plant became operational on 27 July 2022. The news is in line with Europe executives’ mid-July comments, which suggested the factory would start making tyres by the end of July. The latest news is that shipments are now beginning to move out and that the company is planning to “preferentially supply the US until the end of this year [2022]” in order to “meet robust demand there”.
On 27 July 2022, Toyo Tire Corporation promoted one of its environmental health staff to the role of general manager of that division.
For the fourth consecutive year Japanese tyre manufacturer Toyo Tires is partnering the AIG Women’s Open golf championship as a patron and the official tyre of the AIG Women’s Open.
This year, the European Athletics Championships take place in Munich, Germany between 11 and 21 August and will host some 4,700 athletes from 50 nations. Toyo Tires is supporting the event as a partner.
Having previously confirmed that tyre production would begin at the company’s Serbia factory during July, Toyo Europe executives are now specifying that tyres will begin rolling off the production line by the end of the month. When full production gets underway, the factory will be pioneering in green electricity terms since it will utilise bifiacial solar panels.
Occupying one of Autopromotec Hall 20’s largest stands, Toyo made the second generation of its top-selling UHP summer tyre, the Proxes Sport 2 the centrepiece, alongside two recently launched products, the Proxes Comfort summer tyre and the Celsius AS2 all-season tyre. Toyo said the newest tyre marks an important evolution in terms of innovation and technology. “The new UHP summer tyre… has been designed using the most modern technologies known in the sector that have made it possible to produce a highly innovative tyre that aspires to become the technological leader in its segment,” said Dr Davide Dell’Aquila, Toyo Tire Italia.
Tyre comparison website Tyre Reviews has put ten popular tyres for performance cars to the test, making the brand-new Continental SportContact 7 a winner in its first outing on the independent assessment circuit. Reviewer Jonathan Benson fitted the ten tyre combinations to a BMW-powered Toyota Supra in sizes 255/35 R19 (front) and 275/35 R19 (rear) for the test, which he conducted over nine disciplines at Conti’s Contidrom facility. Given that the tyre was proven at the circuit, and is at least 12 months newer than any other product in this test, it is perhaps a little unsurprising that the SportContact 7 prevailed, but with reasonably comfortable first-place finishes in the dry and wet handling and braking tests, Tyre Reviews concludes that the tyre sets “a new standard for the UUHP segment.”
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