Yokohama Rubber expands scope of off-road tire plant in India

Tokyo – Yokohama Rubber Co. has expanded the scope of its off-road tire production plant in India, which is currently under construction in the port city of Visakhapatnam on the Bay of Bengal.

The Japanese group is making an additional investment of $171 million (€146 million) to increase the plant’s daily production in two phases. 

As part of the move, the facility will produce the originally planned 55 tonnes (rubber weight) of tire in the first phase, scheduled for production in the first quarter of 2023.

In the recently introduced second phase, the capacity will increase to 123 tonnes by the first quarter of 2024.

The plant will be operated by Yokohama Off-Highway Tires (YOHT), a subsidiary that was formed in January and combines Yokohama’s off-road tires business with that of the Alliance Tire Group (ATG).

YOHT currently operates two tire plants in India – the Dahej plant in the state of Gujarat and the Tirunelveli plant in Tamil Nadu. 

The two facilities produce three of the group’s core off-highway tire brands – the Alliance, Galaxy and Primex brands – which are used on agricultural, construction, industrial and forestry machinery. 

With global demand expanding, Yokohama Rubber recently expanded capacity at the Dahej Plant and began the construction of the new Visakhapatnam Plant in the third quarter of 2020. 

The Visakhapatnam facility is being built on a 390,000 square metre site, which includes the recently acquired 70,000 square metres of land, Yokohama said. The site also has room for further capacity expansion in the future.

Once completed, the Visakhapatnam facility will raise Yokohama’s overall production capacity for off-road tires to 548 tonnes (rubber weight) per day.

Under its medium-term management plan, Yokohama Transformation 2023?YX2023), Yokohama has positioned off-highway tires as a “growth driver”.