Toyo Tire (U.S.A.) Corp. will hold a press conference next week to announce the location of its new United States tire manufacturing plant.
Toyo parent company Toyo Tire & Rubber Co. Ltd. originally announced plans to build a U.S. plant in February.
The plant is necessary, said Toyo officials, due to "robust overseas demand" that has almost maxed out the company's production capacity in Japan.
Officials said the factory would be located at a site chosen from among several candidates in the eastern half of the country, with a site in Georgia the frontrunner.
Toyo plans to invest $150 million in the plant, which will tentatively be operational sometime in 2006.
Toyo estimates the facility will build two million passenger and light truck tires a year.
Toyo Tire (U.S.A.) Corp. is co-owner with Yokohama Tire Corp. and Continental Tire North America Inc. of the GTY truck tire manufacturing plant in Mount Vernon, Ill.
