New York-listed Cooper Tire & Rubber Company has entered into an agreement to purchase a majority of Qingdao Ge Rui Da Rubber Co., Ltd. based in east China.
Cooper will own 65 percent of the entity, which will be renamed Cooper Qingdao Tire Co., Ltd., for approximately 600 million yuan (93 million U.S. dollars), including the acquisition and initial investments in the operation, according to Cooper.
The transaction is expected to close during the first half of 2016 pending permits and approvals by the Chinese government, according to Cooper.
Ge Rui Da, with about 600 employees, is located in Qingdao of east China's Shandong Province.
The new entity is expected to serve as a global source of truck and bus radial (TBR) tire production for Cooper, including the Roadmaster brand tires for the North American market as well as TBR tires for Asia and other markets.
Passenger car radial (PCR) tires may also be manufactured at the facility in the future. It is estimated that at full capacity, it will be capable of producing approximately 2.5 million to 3 million TBR tires annually and nearly the same number of PCR tires within the existing production facility, with room for further expansion at the location, according to Cooper.
