China Tire Dealer prints an article about avoiding punctures. Many tires in China are still tubed, so a pucture leads to a catastrophic loss of pressure. In a tubeless tire, the pressure can be maintained for a short time, even with a nail penetrating the outer casing. The article looks at Goodyear’s twin-chamber concept tire;
Oscars tribute highlights US tariffs
A somewhat tongue-in-cheek article from China Tire Dealer offers its own answer to Hollywood’s Oscar awards ceremony. Best picture goes to “Tariffs must go” This picture represents the deeply-held view in China that tariffs against China-made tires are unfair and restrictive trade practices. Best Performance goes to Carl Icahn for stopping the acquisition of Pep
The Jiangsu General Science and Technology IPO
The draft prospectus issued ahead of GS IPO contained some interesting data A large spreadsheet containing the Chinese originals and English-language translations of some key data can be downloaded (7.2MB) from this link: http://bit.ly/GST-data The spreadsheet contains the following charts: Profit report 2012-2015 Product and Production capacity and Status by product Production Equipments Status Energy
Banks to promote supply side reform through lending policies
The latest buzzword in Chinese economic policy is supply side reform (SSR). This means rationalising over-capacity, weeding out weaker, low-tech players and adapting existing processes to modern manufacturing techniques. The latest story in the Chinese press suggests that policies will be focussed around lending to support only advanced manufacturing. An example given is the banking
US ITC to investigate TBR tires made in China
A week ago, on Friday 19 Feb, the US ITC voted to investigate the import of truck tires from China. The ITC is expected to report to the commission on Monday 7 March and issue a preliminary determination a week later on 14 March. Regular readers will remember that we addressed this issue a couple
Reactions to TBR investigation in China
The reaction in China to the US actions on TBR tires has been strong. A quote in China Business News says no US tire maker supports the investigation; besides profits have been soaring among US-based tire makers, so there can have been no injury. The report says, “China will closely follow the progress of the
US ITC to drop investigation into Chinese OTR tires
A week ago, on Friday 19 Feb, the US ITC voted unanimously to continue with an investigation into off-the-road (OTR) tires imported from India and Sri Lanka. It decided not to investigate OTR tires made in China and imported into the United States. The argument was that OTR tires from China come in two styles.
Capacity and productivity leads to overseas investments
A long article in China Tire Dealer tracks the issue of productivity. It says that China’s tire capacity in 2015 is around 600m units (郑超). (We believe this is the combined figure for car and truck radials). The domestic replacement market is around 40% of total capacity. Meanwhile the United States accounts for around 25%
2016 to be the year of restructuring?
China Tire Dealer says 2016 must be the year of restructuring in the Chinese Industry. Again, the phrase, ‘Supply side reform’ (SSR) crops up, with a prediction of a deep ‘Winter’ (recession) across many industries as over-capacity is removed and enterprises are upgraded to more modern manufacturing technology. The report quotes Economist Zhong Wei (钟伟)
Markets are there, but we don’t understand them
With the introduction of dual tariffs against Chinese tires, tire makers are seeking new markets. The trougle is, says an article on Tireworld, Chinese tire makers do not know what those markets need. The article quotes Chinese Minister of Trade and Investment Promotion Department (CCPIT) Lin Shunjie (林舜杰). He said that simply identifying a gap

