Coming soon: 'Puncture-proof’ airless tyres that never go flat

COLMAR-BERG, Luxembourg - Airless tyres that never go flat or need to be inflated: It's a decades-long dream that manufacturers hope to turn into a reality soon, but for truck drivers first.

The challenges that the technology faces were put on display at a Goodyear test track in Luxembourg, where a group of journalists put a Tesla equipped with airless tyres through its paces.

Instead of being filled with air, the tyres have a web of spokes that keep the wheels firm and give them a see-through look.

The thin layer of rubber gripping the asphalt has a gargantuan physical challenge to meet: supporting the weight of the car and absorbing shocks as well as standard pneumatic tyres for thousands and thousands of kilometers.

That challenge is being overcome: the tyre's rubber and plastic structure resisted the huge stress as the car banked into the track's tight turns.

The ride is smooth but the grip is not as good as on conventional tyres -- and they are noisier.

The tyres were tested for 120,000 kilometers (75,000 miles) at speeds of up to 160 kph in both scorching temperatures as well as snow, said Michael Rachita, who heads up Goodyear's efforts to develop airless tyres.

"The most obvious advantage is that it's puncture proof," said Rachita.

"It will never run flat, you could drive over any nail and expect not to lose performance," he added.

Rachita said airless tyres will also be maintenance free for drivers as they will never need to check and adjust air pressure.

He said a second generation of airless tyres that are lighter, quieter and roll better are in the works.

GRADUAL TRANSITION SEEN

Michelin has released the Tweel, but it is for construction vehicles rather than cars where the demands in terms of driving performance are much greater.

The French firm has also unveiled the Uptis which it is developing with US car manufacturer General Motors, and which it hopes can make the jump from auto shows to showrooms next year.

Its researchers are working on a cocktail of fiberglass and resin to hold the rubber onto the honeycomb structure of the new tyre. 

But Michelin's CEO Florent Menegaux doesn't expect airless tyres to squeeze out regular tyres anytime soon.

"We're going continue to have air tyres for several decades," he said.

Goodyear, which submitted its first patent on airless tyre technology in 1982, has recently put its food down on the accelerator in terms of research and development.

The US firm aims to have a maintenance-free and long-lasting airless tyre for cars by the end of the decade.

It already has an early version for shuttle buses and automated delivery vehicles on university campuses.

Bridgestone also hopes to have an airless tyre ready within a decade, having already tested early versions on utility vehicles.

Other manufacturers are more skeptical that airless tyres will ever offer comparable shock absorption as traditional tyres and the noise can be reduced sufficiently.

"They aren't a viable solution and I don't expect they will become one," a Continental researcher, Gerrit Bolz, said at a tyre convention in 2017.

ENVIRONMENTAL BENEFITS, ECONOMIC CONCERNS

But independent researcher Ulf Sandberg at the Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute, which is working on an airless tyre for trucks, believes they will eventually become a viable alternative.

"I believe that sooner or later airless tyres could take over," he told AFP.

"If rolling resistance is reduced by 50 percent, it would increase the range of vehicles by 25 percent, and could be extremely valuable" for car manufacturers, particularly for electric vehicles where range is a key concern.

Airless tyres could prove to be environmentally beneficial as they could last the entire lifetime of most vehicles and could then be recycled or retreaded for a second life.

But manufacturers may not be burning rubber to bring airless tyres to market because they also pose threats to their business model, said Sandberg.

A switch to airless tyres would strand the manufacturing equipment used for pneumatic tyres, a heavy cost for the companies to bear.

Given the longevity of the airless tyres, companies would be making less of them.

Goodyear's vice president for product development in Europe, Xavier Fraipont, acknowledged that airless tyres requires a "rethinking our business model, of rethinking our manufacturing".

Yet the possibility of gaining a lead on competitors or being left behind by an affordable and high-performing airless tyre for the consumer market keeps their research rolling forward.

Agence France-Presse

EU orders Amazon to repay $295-M in Luxembourg back taxes

BRUSSELS - Amazon was told on Wednesday to pay about 250 million euros ($295 million) in back taxes to Luxembourg, the latest U.S. tech company to be caught up in a European Union crackdown on unfair tax deals.

The fine was much lower than some sources close to the case had expected and is only a fraction of the 13 billion euros that Apple Inc was ordered to pay to Ireland last year.

EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, who has other big U.S. tech companies in her sights, has taken a tough line on multinational companies' approach to tax.


"Luxembourg gave illegal tax benefits to Amazon. As a result, almost three quarters of Amazon's profits were not taxed," Vestager said.

Amazon said it was considering an appeal.

"We believe that Amazon did not receive any special treatment from Luxembourg and that we paid tax in full accordance with both Luxembourg and international tax law," Amazon said in a statement after the announcement.

Amazon shares were little changed in early Wednesday trading.

Though the EU has taken on several U.S. tech companies, both in antitrust and in tax avoidance cases, Vestager said that her approach was not biased against foreign companies

"This is about competition in Europe, no matter your flag, no matter you ownership," Vestager said.

She also welcomed the debate kicked off by French President Emmanuel Macron who called for more integrated corporate tax regimes in Europe, aiming to close the loopholes used to reduce tax bills.

RAZOR THIN MARGINS

While the exact amount Amazon needs to repay is yet to be calculated, the 250 million euros is significantly less than the 400 million euros which sources close to the matter told Reuters a year ago was under consideration by Vestager.

The bill suggests the Commission believes Amazon shielded around 900 million euros in EU profits from tax, calculations by Reuters show.

For most of its existence, Amazon has worked on razor thin profit margins to fuel its global expansion, making only $2.4 billion profit on global revenues of $136 billion in 2016.

The Commission said Luxembourg allowed Amazon to channel a significant portion of its profits to a holding company without paying tax. The holding company was allowed to do this because it held certain intellectual property rights.

Tax advisers say an important way for companies to shift profits out of the United States is to sell intellectual property, like brands or patents, to a subsidiary in a country where such profits are not taxed and have that unit license the intellectual property to other overseas affiliates.

Amazon's corporate set up with subsidies in Luxembourg was also subject of a $1.5 billion court case with U.S. tax authorities, which Amazon won in March.

Amazon, which employs 1,500 in the grand duchy, is one of the biggest employers in the country of half a million people. It has a Europe-wide staff of some 50,000.

Luxembourg, whose tiny economy has benefited from providing a European base for multinational companies, rejected the finding and said it was looking at its legal options.

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker was prime minister of Luxembourg for almost two decades until 2013 and has been criticised for his role in enabling the many tax deals that are now being unravelled. He denies doing anything wrong and says the Commission is committed to ensuring fair taxation.

In 2014, Luxembourg made international headlines in the wake of the publication of "LuxLeaks", documents that showed how large accounting firms helped multinational companies channel proceeds through the country while paying little or no tax.

Luxembourg is also under EU scrutiny over tax deals with fast food chain McDonald's and French energy company Engie. Luxembourg has appealed against a ruling in 2015 that carmaker Fiat should pay it back taxes. As well as Ireland, tax for multinationals in Belgium and the Netherlands have also come under Commission scrutiny.

"Luxembourg has been fully cooperating with the Commission in its investigation and is strongly committed to tax transparency and the fight against harmful tax avoidance," the country's finance ministry said on Wednesday.

Amazon revamped its European tax practices in 2015 so that it can book sales and pay taxes in Britain, Germany, Spain and Italy instead of channeling all sales through Luxembourg where it is headquartered, a move that may raise its tax bill.

(Addtional reporting by Tom Bergin, Editing by Alastair Macdonald, Jane Merriman and Mark Potter)

source: news.abs-cbn.com