Goodyear has honoured 143 of its employees for their inventive activities during a recent evening event held at Casino 2000 in Mondorf-les-Bains.

Joe Zekoski, Senior Vice President and CTO, Darren Wells, Goodyear chairman of Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA), Michel Rzonzef, truck tyres vice president for EMEA, and Jean-Pierre Jeusette, Director General Goodyear Research Center in Colmar-Berg (GIC*L), presented "Patent and Trade Secret Award" plaques to employees of GIC*L, Global Engineering & Manufacturing Technology, Department of quality Q-Tech, the Tire Plant, as well as the Centre for Research Dunlop in Hanau (D).

Bernd Kutsch, Head of Patents at GIC*L, initiated the traditional evening awards and introduced the guest of honour, Laurent Federspiel of LuxInnovation, who also addressed the winners.

In his speech, Mr. Kutsch said that the number of patents and 'trade secrets' registered last year had increased significantly compared to previous years. Jean-Pierre Jeusette also congratulated the inventors for their efforts: "This evening is always a great opportunity to see our driving force for innovation and I am confident that we can expect a similar result, if not the best, for 2015."

One of the products on which a lot of effort had been invested was certainly the "UltraGrip 9" new winter tyre, already crowned with numerous awards. The inventors of this new product have consequently been named "Inventors of the Year 2014", as the researchers who developed the "intelligent tyre".

The Research and Development Center in Colmar-Berg is the largest group in Europe and the second in the world after the mother house in Akron USA. With its 3,250 employees, Goodyear in Colmar-Berg is the second industrial employer in the Grand Duchy.