Production at Michelin’s new factory in Chennai, India should be underway by November 2012. B Kumar, national sales manager for Michelin India’s truck and bus division, confirmed this date to the Press Trust of India, adding the tyre maker has already employed some 500 plant workers and “plans to hire more soon.” According to PTI, a workforce of around 1,500 is planned for the facility’s initial phase.
Omitec has announced that it will supply and provide support for diagnostic tools throughout the National Tyres and Autocare network in the UK. The equipment supplier will provide its OmiScan II professional diagnostic scan tool to all 227 branches over the summer months. Each branch will receive initial training and will have access to the Omitec support line for ongoing information. Each tool is updated on a continuous basis with the latest software releases from Omitec.
National road safety charity Brake is appealing to companies to register now for Road Safety Week 2011 to help spread life-saving road safety awareness on UK roads. The week will run from 21-27 November. Brake campaigns director Julie Townsend says: “Companies can play a crucial role in spreading road safety awareness and helping to prevent needless tragedies on our roads.
Kumho Tyre Australia has appointed a new motorsport tyre distributor in the state of New South Wales. North Parramatta, Sydney-based Peak Race Tyres is now responsible for handling sales of motorsport tyres to competitors in track-based events around the state. Despite this arrangement, F-SPORT will continue to service major motor sport events around the country.
Kwik-Fit Fleet has appointed Martin Towers to lead its 13-strong sales team. The new corporate and national sales director takes on responsibility for managing both sides of Kwik-Fit Fleet’s sales departments, namely corporate account managers, who handle relationships with contract hire and leasing companies, and area sales managers, who manage partnerships with outright purchase fleets.
Bridgestone UK has been offering training programmes to service providers, and more recently its customer technicians, across a wide variety of high-interest topics for several years. More recently the tyre manufacturer has been assessed by the Institute of Road Transport Engineers (IRTE) for its ‘Wheel Security Training Course’ and is said to have passed with flying colours.
CB Skip Hire of Salisbury, Wiltshire has been fined £150,000 for failing to ensure workers’ safety after Slovakian worker Jozef Trhan was killed while inflating a tyre on one of the company’s industrial waste moving machines in February 2008. The tyre exploded after sections of the wheel Trhan had welded earlier that day came apart, causing the inner tube to explode. Salisbury Crown Court found the company had not checked Trhan had been given the training necessary to complete the tasks.
The NTDA (National Tyre Distributors Association) has opted to make its “Licence to Fit” roadside technician accreditation scheme a requirement of membership.
The decision forms of the culmination of a process that began with the deaths of six vehicle recovery operators who were killed on Britain's motorways and hard shoulders in 1998. This prompted the AA and the RAC to fund the establishment of SURVIVE in March 1999. SURVIVE stands for Safe Use of Roadside Verges In Vehicular Emergencies and the purpose of the group was to promote the safety of people working or stopping on motorway hard shoulders and high-speed dual carriageways. The SURVIVE Group is a partnership between the Highways Agency, ACPO (the Association of Chief Police Officers), the breakdown/recovery industry and other service providers.
Off-road tyre specialist Titan International has formed a new company, Titan Mining Services. The initial location where this company will operate is Fort Mackay, in the Canadian province of Alberta; Titan Mining Services will offer complete tyre, wheel and track services for end users.
ATS Euromaster is seeking to raise awareness of the danger of commercial vehicle tyre explosions by releasing ideo footage showing the catastrophic effects of inflating a truck tyre which has previously suffered run-flat damage.
The recording forms part of training DVD produced in-house and being shown to ATS Euromaster’s 2,300-strong operations team. It forms part of the company’s new ‘Safe by Choice’ initiative and reinforces the safe methods of operation which must be followed with all truck, earthmover and agricultural tyres. The footage also serves as a timely reminder of why tyres should always be serviced by professional tyre technicians.
Bridgestone UK’s training department has announced the addition of a fourth element to its Retail Business Development training programme. Dealer Selecta Tyre has been the first to engage with the new module, believing Bridgestone to “[understand] the tyre retail business better than any other external management training company we have been involved with in the past,” according to sales director Nick Henshall: “Selecta Tyre is growing as a business and as such we recognise that our retail managers are of vital importance to us continuing to achieve our future company strategies and goals.
On June 30 Prof. Dr. Djoko Said Damardjati ended his three-year tenure as Secretary General of the Association of Natural Rubber Producing Countries and handed the reigns to Dato’ Dr. Kamarul Baharain bin Basir. Following the end of his term, Damardjati has taken up the post of principal scientist in the Centre for Food Crops, part of Indonesia’s Ministry of Agriculture.
Goodyear is well known for its tyres, yet more than a few people may be surprised to learn that the company has also been involved in the blood donation business for almost six decades. Since 1952, workers at the US-based firm’s headquarters have donated a total of 182,663 pints of blood – that’s 86,431 litres – for use at local hospitals. These employee donations have benefitted 547,989 patients over the years, and Goodyear’s long-term dedication to blood donation has now earned the company the “2010 Top Corporate Blood Donor Award” from Northern Ohio Red Cross Blood Services. The award was recently presented to Goodyear chief health officer Brent Pawlecki.
Kwik Fit has announced a 2011 banded pay settlement for 4,400 employees in its 676 UK centres. The settlement provides an increase of 3 per cent for fitting staff on the standard company salary for their grade, affecting the majority of the workforce. All other staff, including managers, supervisors, MOT testers and service technicians, will receive a 2 per cent increase. Kwik Fit said the agreement was reached after amicable discussions with the trade union Unite. The pay increase will be backdated to 1 January 2011.
Fast fitter ATS Euromaster has been given HR Magazine’s “Best HR Team – Private Sector” and “Most Effective Use of Internal Communication” awards, recognising a year in which human resources strategy was used to help the company through the difficulties of the recession. The company entered 2008 with severe economic problems and had to close approximately 80 of its smaller service centres. The department used employee forums, road shows, DVDs and training programmes in a three-year strategy designed to make the company communicate better internally and provide a better service for customers. The Awards, run by HR Magazine, were presented to Group HR director Irene Stark and Jane Linnell, Group Internal Communications Manager, in front of more than 500 guests, most of them senior HR professionals from top UK companies.
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