Tire Business ranks the Top 75 Tire Makers of 2023

UPDATE: Read the new 2024 Top 75 ranking

With a few notable exceptions, major players in the global tire industry enjoyed growth in sales and earnings in fiscal 2022.

After all was said and done, the top of the ranking is very familiar: the top 11 companies hold the same position as the year before. The first change comes at No. 12, occupied this year by China's Sailun Group Co. Ltd., based on fiscal 2022 revenue of $3.29 billion.

Group Michelin retained the No. 1 ranking with tire-related revenue of $28.3 billion, comfortably ahead of No. 2 Bridgestone's estimated tire-centric total of $26.6 billion.

Goodyear — with a full year of revenue from the Cooper Tire & Rubber assets acquired in early 2021 now incorporated — and Continental A.G. are ensconced comfortably at Nos. 3 and 4, with revenue of $17.9 billion and $12.4 billion, respectively.

Goodyear's acquisition of Cooper has been central to the company's growth of nearly 43% since 2019, the last full year before the COVID-19 pandemic took root.

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The vast majority (22) of the 27 companies tracked by Tire Business for this report enjoyed double-digit growth in fiscal 2022 over 2021 as the world's major market economies continued to rebound from the depths of the COVID-19-induced economic malaise of 2020 and the recovery year of 2021.

Michelin and Kumho Tire Co. Inc. topped the growth charts with revenue improvements of 39.7% and 36.8%, respectively. Only the Taiwanese companies Cheng Shin Rubber Industries Ltd. and Nankang Rubber Tire Corp. reported lower sales last year versus 2021.

Exceptions to the strong growth trend were companies from China, the majority of which saw sales decline, dragged down by a sluggish domestic market and the continued existence of trade barriers in place by a growing number of international markets. Sailun Group was one of the few to report increased sales last year over 2021.

The scale and impact of the U.S.' import duties on Chinese products are well documented. More recently, South Africa imposed a package of antidumping duties on new pneumatic tires originating from China. On July 28, the International Trade Commission of South Africa (ITAC) announced duties ranging from 7.18% to 43.6% on passenger and truck/bus tires manufactured in China.

According to the ITAC, the "dumped imports" gained market share while the domestic industry lost market share, and it is "unable to produce at full capacity."

At the same time, authorities in Mexico are evaluating potential import duties on tires from China in response to petitions from the domestic tire manufacturing industry there. Any potential action there is not expected before 2024, however, sources indicate.

Overall, the size of the global market, as expressed in U.S. dollars, grew only marginally as shifting currency exchange rates ate into sales gains many companies enjoyed in their home reporting currencies.

Tire Business translates the various tire makers' revenues into dollars using an averaged annual exchange rate, so as to avoid temporary swings in the values of various currencies.

Nevertheless, the averages for 2022 versus 2021 for most of the major currencies shifted measurably, by double-digits in many cases, as many other national economies fared worse than the U.S.

The value of the Japanese yen/U.S. dollar exchange rate, for example, shifted 20% year over year. The Euro/dollar rate moved 12.4%.

That anomaly meant most of the revenue gains reported by the leading tire makers in their home reporting currencies were for the most part negated when being reported in dollars.

The retrenchment on the part of many Chinese companies and the currency-rate situation combined to leave the estimated world value of the tire industry only marginally better than that for 2021 — $188.6 billion versus $188 billion.

For the annual Top 75 Tire Makers ranking, Tire Business looks at the tire makers' revenue generated from the sale of tires they've manufactured, in order to achieve a more equitable apples-to-apples comparison.

Excluded are items such as third-party sales of materials (steel cord, synthetic rubber, carbon black, etc.) as well as any non-tire-related revenue and non-tire revenue (auto service, e.g.) generated by a tire maker's company-owned retail or commercial tire sales networks.

Bridgestone, Michelin, Goodyear and Continental, for example, report hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars in such revenue from their respective auto- or truck-servicing networks.

The "wild card" in the deck is Yokohama Rubber Co. Ltd. (YRC), whose acquisition of Trelleborg Wheel Systems — concluded in May after more than a year of due diligence and other considerations — eventually will boost the Japanese tire maker's full-year revenue by $1 billion or more.

With that much additional revenue, YRC will be poised to challenge Pirelli & C. S.p.A. and Hankook Tire & Technology Co. Ltd. for the No. 6 spot on the ranking as all of them push toward $7 billion in annual tire-related sales. Depending on these three firms' growth, as well as that by Sumitomo Rubber Industries Ltd., this could evolve into a four-way scrap for No. 5.

For fiscal 2023, the impact will be a bit less, since the deal didn't close officially until May. Therefore, YRC's accounts will include seven months of TWS-related sales.

• Zodo Tire Co. Ltd., a Heze City, Shadong, China-based enterprise that combines the assets of at least three other existing Chinese tire makers: Shandong Weifang Yuelong Rubber Group, Huadong Tire Co. Ltd., and — as of earlier this year — Shandong Kaixuan Rubber Co. Ltd.

Zodo debuts at No. 44 with fiscal 2022 sales of $371 million. The enterprise claims a daily production ticket of over 65,000 passenger, light truck and medium truck tires. Zodo's brand portfolio includes Fronway, Goldshield, Grenlander, Link, Rockblade and Zmax.

• Tianjin Wanda Tire Group at No. 60 with sales of $239 million. Founded in 1998, Tianjin Wanda operates three tire plants in Tianjin and Hebei provinces, producing two-wheeler and passenger tires. The sales footprint spans the globe. It goes to market under the Armor, Hakuba, Halberd, Journey and WDT brands.

• Panther Tyres Ltd. at No. 74 with fiscal 2021 sales of $126 million; Formerly known as Mian Tyres, the Lahore, Pakistan-based company's fiscal year ends June 30 and, as such, hasn't reported 2022-23 fiscal-year sales yet.

• Ralson Tyres Ltd. at No. 75 with fiscal 2021 sales of $122.8 million. The Ludhiana, India-based company is likely to be shown much higher in coming years as its export-oriented venture into truck/bus tires ramps up.

Companies ranked in the Top 75 this year are based in 18 nations, with China (31) having the most. Three Chinese companies, Zhongce Rubber Group Co. Ltd. (No. 9); Sailun Group (No. 12); and Linglong Group Co. Ltd. (No. 17), are ranked among the Top 20.

Other countries represented are: India with eight companies; Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and the U.S. with four each; Italy and Turkey, three each; Pakistan, Russia and Vietnam, two each; and one each from Argentina, Belarus, Finland, France, Germany, Iran, Singapore and Thailand.

Collectively, the top 10 represent $115 billion in sales, or roughly 61% of the global total.

The average sales/employee for the top-ranked companies that publish employee numbers was $223,437, up 3.4% over the fiscal 2021 figure.

Nokian Tyres generated the most sales per employee, $337,906, ahead of Balkrishna Industries Ltd. ($360,017) and Toyo Tire Corp. ($358,124).