Continental AG is “more than seriously” thinking about building its first tyre manufacturing facility in China, the country head said in an interview.
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“We are more than just seriously considering to start local production,” Klaus Kreipe, chief of Continental Tyres’ China operation, told Reuters, though he did not discuss timing.
The report said Continental started exporting to China 10 years ago, supplying replacements for the likes of BMW and Mercedes.
It set up its first China office in January 2006, as a relative latecomer compared with Goodyear and Michelin which began local production in the mid-1990s, the report noted.
Kreipe told Reuters Conti aimed to sell 500,000 tyres in China in 2008, adding 100 franchised retail outlets in China by the end of the year.
Kreipe also said he saw new business opportunities among growing Chinese automakers, which are eager to improve their vehicles’ safety standards as they push aggressively overseas.
Controversy surrounded Chinese light truck tyres in the US recently after the importer said it could not afford to recall a type implicated in a rollover accident and asked for help from a national government agency.
“That for us is just an example of how much benefit we can bring to those customers, by making clear that these things will never happen with a Continental tyre,” Kreipe told Reuters.
The tyre maker has held initial talks with several Chinese automakers but no agreement has been finalised yet, he added, according to the report.
