AKRON — Maxion Wheels USA L.L.C. is shutting its Akron plant, resulting in the layoff of 80 workers.
The company told the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services Aug. 11 that it plans to close the plant, in east Akron near Goodyear's headquarters, by mid-December.
Maxion, a Novi, Mich.-based subsidiary of Brazil's Iochpe-Maxion S.A., makes a variety of steel and aluminum wheels for passenger, commercial and specialty vehicles.
Maxion's Akron employees will lose their jobs beginning sometime around Nov. 6, the company said in its Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act filing with the state.
One supplier to the company, who did not want to be named, shared a letter with Crain's Cleveland Business that Maxion sent out saying the company was consolidating its steel-wheel manufacturing operations to two plants from three.
Maxion also has plants in Michigan, Missouri and Mexico, according to its website. Its site does not specify what types of wheels it makes at each plant, and a company manager in Akron could not be reached for further details.
The company, along with fellow commercial vehicle wheel maker Accuride Corp., petitioned the U.S. government in 2018, seeking the imposition of antidumping and countervailing duties on U.S. imports of certain steel wheels from China, including road-going hub- and stud-piloted steel wheels with rim diameters of 22.5 and 24.5 inches designed principally for use on Class 6, 7 and 8 commercial vehicles.
That petition resulted in the U.S. Department of Commerce's levying antidumping duties of 231.7 percent and countervailing duties of 457.1 percent against imports of steel commercial vehicle wheels from China in early 2019.