Goodyear completes negotiations with its lenders

April 1, 2003

Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. has successfully completed a comprehensive refinancing and

restructuring of its bank credit and accounts receivable facilities.

"These new agreements will provide Goodyear with additional financial flexibility and liquidity," says Bob Keegan, CEO and president. "They give us both the time and the opportunity to turn around our North American Tire business."

In an official statement, Goodyear says it is replacing a total of $2.94 billion in financing with $3.3 billion in credit facilities that include:

* a $750 million secured U.S. revolving credit facility due in 2005.

* a $645 million secured U.S. term facility due in 2005.

* $650 million of secured European facilities due in 2005.

* $1.3 billion of secured asset-based facilities due in 2006.

The restructured credit agreements replace facilities that generally had shorter maturities but, with the exception of $763 million in U.S. and Canadian accounts receivable facilities, were unsecured. Certain

international accounts receivable securitizations, which the company intends to replace or restructure, remain in place, as do a limited amount of additional foreign committed and uncommitted lines of credit.

Goodyear will file Form 12b-25, "Notification of Late Filing," as required by the Securities and Exchange Commission today in connection with the delay in the filing of its annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended Dec. 31,

2002.

The company plans to report fourth quarter 2002 financial results at 8:30 a.m. EST Thursday, April 3, to be followed by an investor conference call at 10 a.m. Goodyear also intends to file its Form 10-K on April 3.

Participating in the conference call with Keegan will be Robert Tieken, executive vice president and chief financial officer.

Shareholders, members of the media and other interested persons may access the conference call on the Web site or via telephone by calling

(706) 634-5954 before 9:55 a.m. April 3. A taped replay of the conference call will be available at 2 p.m. April 3 by calling (706) 645-9291 and entering access code 9550124.

The call replay will also remain available

on the Web site.