India's TVS buying Super Grip to propel N. American growth

LAS VEGAS — Indian two-wheeler and off-highway tire maker TVS Srichakra Ltd. has acquired U.S. industrial tire producer/distributor Super Grip Corp. L.L.C. ahead of plans to step up its presence in North America.

TVS Srichakra, makers of TVS Eurogrip, Eurogrip and TVS tire brands, will use Super Grip's Piney Flats, Tenn., location as its U.S. headquarters, according to S. Mathan Babu, vice president, OHT global sales and marketing, who spoke with Tire Business at the 2023 SEMA Show.

Super Grip "fits in well with our plan to expand our off-highway tire business globally," TVS Srichakra Director S. Ravichandran said in a company statement released in India.

TVS' board approved funding in early October of $10 million toward the acquisition, according to stock exchange filings.

With fiscal 2023 sales of $389.5 million, TVS is considered the No. 52 tire maker worldwide, according to Tire Business' annual Global Tire Report ranking, with factories in Madurai, Tamil Nadu and Rudrapur, Uttarakhand, with combined production capacity of over 3 million tires a month.

The Madurai, India-based company derives nearly 80% of its annual revenue from the sale of tires for two- and three-wheeled vehicles, and domestic sales account for nearly 83% of annual sales.

Sun Tyre & Wheel Systems, a major producer of industrial tires at plants in India and Sri Lanka, is a sister company of TVS Srichraka under the ownership of Sundaram Industries Pvt. Ltd.

Scott Whitney, CEO of Super Grip for the past eight years, said the TVS deal is the culmination of a months-long search for an equity partner sought to help build Super Grip's manufacturing and distribution base.

That search was tied to requests from the family of Super Grip founder Spencer Christenberry, who died in 2015, to develop a longer-term strategy for the company. The firm's ownership had resided in a family trust following Christenberry's death.

In business since 1984, Super Grip sources most of its tires from suppliers in Asia but does produce some solid and lined tires in Piney Flats.

The company, which often goes to market under the "bigger, badder, better" moniker coined by Christenberry, also is active in the ATV/UTV market, distributing a range of brands such as Amp, Diamond Back, Shredder, Stinger, Super Light and XT.

The company is preparing to move to larger facilities in 2024, Whitney said, with a 150,000-sq.-ft. building in nearby Bristol, Tenn., at the top of the list of potential sites. This and other actions being discussed could result in a doubling of the firm's workforce to 50 or more, Whitney said.

TVS's takeover of Super Grip will bring an experienced and motivated management team, which will add value to the business over time, Ravichandran said, without disclosing his company's expectations for growing the off-highway tire business.

Whitney joined Super Grip in 2015 after the death of Chistenberry. Prior to that we he worked with Taylor Machine Works Inc., producer of materials-handling equipment such as fork lifts, log stackers, container handlers and reach stackers. As such, he was familiar with and had worked with Super Grip in developing a "Tug" brand tire for use on Taylor's Tug-brand fork lifts.