Apollo Tyres has opened a €475m (US$505m) manufacturing facility in Hungary, located less than 100km from Budapest and built on 72ha of land. Construction for the new facility took approximately two years. The state-of-the-art greenfield factory is outfitted with highly automated systems that use the latest IT and robotics.
It will produce both Apollo and Vredestein branded tires for the European market. Capacity at the end of phase 1 will be 5.5 million passenger car and light truck tires and 675,000 commercial vehicle tires. The majority of employees have been hired locally.
Said chairman Onkar S Kanwar at the inauguration last week, “With this inauguration of our Hungary greenfield facility, we have crossed another milestone in our global growth journey. This facility will help us further increase our presence and market share in Europe. From being a replacement market-focused company in Europe, we are soon to begin supplies of our tires to all the leading OEs in Europe.”
More on the facility in the July issue of Tire Technology International.
