AKRON—Sumitomo Rubber Industries Ltd.'s (SRI) deal to buy the rights to the Dunlop brand in North America and Europe from Goodyear reunites the brand globally under a single owner for the first time in nearly a quarter century.
The eponymous brand—Scottish veterinarian and inventor John Boyd Dunlop is credited with developing in 1888 the first workable pneumatic tire—was last united under Sumitomo Rubber from the mid-1980s through 1999, when SRI and Goodyear formed a global alliance and split the rights to the Dunlop name along geographic lines.
When that alliance was dissolved in 2015, Goodyear retained the Dunlop brand rights for Europe and North America, leading SRI to double down on its Falken brand, which has become the company's primary brand in Europe and North America, its two largest geographic regions.
According to Goodyear, its sales of Dunlop-brand tires totaled $755 million in 2023—consumer tire sales of $532 million, commercial tire sales of $201 million and specialty tire sales (excluding motorcycle) of $22 million.
That amount of additional sales revenue will push SRI toward the $8 billion revenue level and ensconce the Kobe, Japan-based company solidly as the No. 5 tire maker worldwide ahead of Pirelli & C. S.p.A.
Separately, Brand Finance, a London-based independent brand valuation and strategy consultancy, rates the Dunlop brand as the fifth most valuable brand in the tire industry, trailing Michelin, Bridgestone, Continental and Goodyear. Brand Finance assesses brands' strength through a "balanced scorecard of metrics" evaluating marketing investment, stakeholder equity and business performance.