LONDON (June 22, 2016) — Pirelli Tyre S.p.A. has merged its Europe and Middle East & Africa industrial tire businesses to form an EMEA unit based in Istanbul, with Murat Akyildiz as CEO of the new unit.
Pirelli confirmed the change, first reported in Turkish media, in a written statement to European Rubber Journal, a sister publication of Tire Business based in London.
To form the EMEA region, Pirelli explained, “the European region of Pirelli Industrial Tires, managed from Milan, Italy, was combined with its MEA Region which comprised the Middle East including Turkey and the African countries.”
Mr. Akyildiz, CEO of Turkey/MEA/India for Pirelli Industrial since September 2015, was promoted to CEO of the newly combined business, which encompasses 128 countries and represents an annual production capacity of around 2 million truck and agricultural tires.
Pirelli's factory in Kocaeli, Turkey, has an annual production capacity of 7 million units of 675 different kinds of tires.
The restructuring comes in the wake of a recent takeover of Pirelli by the Chinese state-owned China National Chemical Corp. in June. As part of the takeover, ChemChina and Pirelli agreed to merge industrial tire production units at Pirelli and Aeolus and double capacity in the business unit.
Mr. Akyildiz was with Procter & Gamble for 13 years before joining Pirelli in 2015.
Last November, Pirelli said Marco Tronchetti Provera, executive vice president and CEO of Pirelli, would take direct responsibility for the development path of the company's industrial activities in connection with ChemChina's acquisition of Pirelli.
At that time, Pirelli said Lorenzo Sistino, general manager of Pirelli Tyre S.p.A.'s industrial business, was leaving the company at year-end after just five months with the Italian tire maker.
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Shahrzad Pourriahi is a reporter with European Rubber Journal, a London-based sister publication of Tire Business.