Hankook Tire on a roll again after wage deal strike

Hankook Tire & Technology, the world's sixth-largest tiremaker by sales, said it resumed operations at its two plants in Korea on Sunday, 26 days after a strike began over this year's wage deal.

The deal reached Friday includes a 6 percent increase in basic monthly pay, 5 million won ($4,200) in performance-based pay and a bonus of 2 million won per worker.

The agreement ended the strike that began Nov. 24. It marked the first strike since the foundation of the company's labor union in 1962.

A Hankook Tire official said the company plans to normalize the production at its two plants in Korea, which have a combined daily production capacity of 100,000 units.

From January to September, Hankook Tire's net profit more than doubled to 525.4 billion won from 235.2 billion won a year earlier.

Hankook Tire earns over 80 percent of its total revenue from abroad.

It has eight plants — two in Korea, one in Hungary, one in the United States, three in China and one in Indonesia — whose combined capacity reaches 102 million tires per year.

Yonhap