TOKYO (June 6, 2006) — Bridgestone Corp. has selected a site in northwest Poland for its next plant, a $258 million truck and bus tire factory due on stream in the first half of 2009.
Construction on the plant, to be located on a 1,050-acre site near the city of Stargard Szczecinski, won't start before the first half of 2007, Bridgestone said. The plant will be rated at 5,000 tires a day at full capacity, which won't be reached before 2011.
Stargard Szczecinski is a city of 74,000 located on the Ina River 25 miles from the Polish-German border and 75 miles from the Baltic Sea coast. Bridgestone did not say what incentives, if any, it received from local, state or national authorities to locate in Poland or what the expected employment would be.
This will be Bridgestone's 51st tire plant worldwide, its second tire plant in Poland and only its second truck and bus tire plant in Europe.
“Securing another truck and bus tire production site will enhance the company's degree of self-sufficiency in the region and contribute to the creation of a strategic product supply system,” the firm said in a prepared statement.
The new plant will be operated by a wholly owned subsidiary of Bridgestone Europe N.V./S.A.
Bridgestone already operates two plants in Poland—a performance tire plant in Poznan and an air springs plant in Wolsztyn—and is building a rubber track factory in Wroclaw that's due on stream in July. Its other truck tire plant in Europe is in Bilbao, Spain.