Bridgestone announces 25 billion yen investment at Japan’s Kitakyushu plant
Tokyo: Bridgestone Corporation today announced that it will invest ¥25 billion to upgrade equipment for certain facilities at the Kitakyushu Plant, which produces tires for mining and construction vehicles.
This upgrade will be completed by the end of 2027.
This strategic investment is a part of Bridgestone’s Mid Term Business Plan (2024-2026) to focus on delivering value over volume as it strengthens its off-the-road (OTR) tire business, which drives the Company’s premium tire business.
The Kitakyushu Plant is the strategic global production base for OTR tires, including Bridgestone’s Dan-Totsu products1--Bridgestone Mastercore and supplies to customers globally.
This strategic investment will not only ensure a high quality and stable supply, but also further elevate the level of safety, disaster prevention, eco-friendliness, quality, and productivity.
Furthermore, the investment will enhance production technology for the future generation of Dan-Totsu products.
As the investment focuses on upgrading existing equipment, the production volume will remain at current level.
Bridgestone is expanding its mining solutions to maximize productivity and economic value in mining operations. This is achieved by fusing strong physical capabilities with digital technologies.
Bridgestone's physical capabilities include field engineering services at mining sites (Genbutsu-Genba) for tire maintenance and optimal use, supported by a global service solution network of approximately 130 sites.
By fusing these strong physical capabilities and the digital capabilities, such as AI-driven tire and vehicle data analytics, Bridgestone aims to evolve and expand its mining solutions.
The solutions are further enhanced by vehicle operation data shared from customers based on trusts.
In July 2023, Bridgestone started to offer a new mining solutions service that optimize tire maintenance timing and vehicle operation routes with tire durability prediction model by leveraging AI to build its unique algorithms.
This service was firstly introduced to the Spence copper mine (Pampa Norte operation) in Chile, operated by BHP Group Limited & Plc.
Bridgestone amplifies the value of its Dan-Totsu products at the stage where customers use tires to solve their problems.
The company contributes to sustainability by improving resource productivity since using tires safer, longer, better and more efficiently reduces the number of tires used.
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