BONITA SPRINGS, Fla. (Jan. 6, 2012) — Continental Tire the Americas L.L.C. is tripling the production capacity for ContiTread tread rubber at its Conti LifeCycle tread rubber plant in Morelia, Mexico, to meet “overwhelming demand” from customers throughout the Americas.
The multi-million-dollar investment doubles the size of the plant to more than 43,000 square feet and includes an additional curing and finishing line, according to Paul Williams, executive vice president for truck tires in the Americas, who disclosed the expansion this week at Conti's annual commercial vehicle tire dealer meeting in Bonita Springs.
“This expansion allows us to accommodate the growing need for retreaded truck tires in our current markets, and to comfortably expand as we reach even further across the Americas,” Mr. Williams told a crowd of more than 150 U.S. and Canadian dealers attending the meeting.
“The result is that Continental now has the ability to cap more than 1.2 million truck tires annually with our ContiTreads. An additional expansion has already been planned for 2014, which involves yet another curing and finishing line to be installed,” he added.
Mr. Williams attributed the “skyrocketing growth” of the ContiLifeCycle business to the need for fleets in the Americas to have an economical lifetime truck tire solution, and also to the high level of interest from dealers in each country.
Thus far Conti has disclosed only one LifeCycle retread system licensee in the U.S.—King Tire Service Inc. of Blufield, W.Va.—which began production last fall. Conti also has a demonstration plant in operation near Phoenix and operates two retread plants in Ecuador.