The Chinese rubber industry experienced its greatest annual slowdown ever in 2015, with one of the industry’s leading products, tires, finishing the year with negative growth. The downturns in the Chinese and global economies were major contributing factors. In fact, the growth rate of the global economy’s real gross domestic product (GDP) was around 3 percent in 2015, the lowest...
The Chinese rubber industry must boost productivity, alternative energy use and strive for digitization if it is to reach its targets for 2025, says Fan Rende, Honorary Chairman of the China Rubber Industry Association (CRIA). Speaking at the China Rubber Conference held in March in Qingdao, Shandong Province, the 73-year-old Fan outlined the tasks facing the domestic Chinese industry in...
When the Great East Japan Earthquake occurred in 2011, its hypocenter some 70 kilometers off the coast of Sendai City, Miyagi Prefecture, buildings were left devastated. However, this was primarily the result not of the 9.0 magnitude earthquake itself, which many buildings were able to withstand, but of the subsequent tsunami. As a method of addressing seismic activity, the use...
The aftershocks continue from the major earthquake that struck the Kumamoto Prefecture on the Japanese island of Kyushu April 14. Almost two months after the original quake registered a seismic intensity of 7, an aftershock of intensity 5- struck on June 13. Although it cannot be said that the 24 buildings in Kumamoto Prefecture that incorporate seismic isolation rubber came...
New Balance Athletic Shoe Inc. has announced that it will be releasing its New Balance Numeric line of shoes in Japan this July. It is the first action sports line in the brand’s history. Serving as the company’s entry point into the lifestyle category of sports footwear, the new line is aimed squarely at skateboarders. New Balance, which celebrates its...
Mitsuboshi Belting Ltd. (TYO:5192) is riding strong sales of its E-Power and other energy-efficient V-belts, particularly for air-conditioning applications in factories and commercial buildings. The company’s synchronous belts for injection molding machines are also selling well. Expanding sales of high-torque belts are contributing to healthy business. Looking at the general industrial transmission belt market in Japan for the foreseeable future,...
