Nexen set to officially open European tire plant

Seoul – Nexen Tire will hold an official opening ceremony for its new Europe manufacturing plant in Zatec, the Czech Republic, on 28 Aug, the South Korean tire maker has announced.

Petr O?ko, the Czech deputy minister of industry and trade; Byung-Joong Kang, the chairman and Travis Kang, the global CEO of Nexen Tire will attend the ceremony, Nexen said in a 5 Aug release.

Spanning 650,000 square metres, the €830-million plant has been operational since April.

Described by Nexen as a “technologically integrated manufacturing centre”, the plant has been named one of Nexen’s four major global R&D and production networks, after Nexen univerCITY, in Seoul, Korea, the Europe R&D centre in Germany and the North America technology centre in Ohio.

The production capacity of the Zatec plant will be 3 million units in 2019, according to Nexen.

The tire-maker plans to gradually ramp up production to over 11 million units a year by 2020.

“With the opening of the Europe Plant, Nexen Tire plans to develop, produce and distribute products customised for the European market,” said Travis Kang.