Hiroshi Tsuchiya, technical director of the company, is being elevated to the position of the managing director effective from September 27. Tsuchiya's predecessor K Sasamoto will be returning to Japan.

Tsuchiya will have difficult job at hand in pushing the company's sales with the tyre industry just recovering from a three-year long recession that has hit the bottomlines of most of the major companies.

During the period, passenger car market has not grown much and radialisation of the segment still remains a distant dream. However, with recent entrants like Hyundai, Daewoo and Telco in the small car market, sale of radial tyres - the company's main product - is likely to pick up.

The joint venture company, Bridgestone ACC was incorporated on February 27, 1996, and its first product was launched in the repalcement market on July 18, 1998 in Delhi.

The company's growth in the country has been spearheaded with the launch of its latest high performance radials based on the `Donuts' technolgy launched in April 1999. Bridgestone ACC has accelerated the radialisation process of the Indian automotive passenger car market from 30 per cent to 45 per cent, said a company press release.

The release put out on Thrusday said: "Tsuchiya joined Bridgestone Corporation in 1961 working in the tyre design department in Tokyo Technical Centre till 1974. He has been involved in the Indian joint-venture project since 1995."

"He is an acknowledged expert in radial tyre technology. His career in manufacturing and production management started in 1992 in Bridgestone Corporation's Kurume factory which is considered the mother plant," the release added.

Bridgestone is a $18 billion company worldwide which controls about 19 per cent of the global tyre market. From just one facotry at Kurume the company today has grown to a conglomerate with 41 tyre plants,51 non-tyre plants, three technology R&D centres and seven proving grounds.