Bridgestone Firestone Designs Dueler™ Concept Tire For HUMMER HX Concept

DETROIT, Mich. (Jan. 13, 2008) – Millions of Bridgestone-brand Dueler tires can be found on light trucks from New York to Los Angeles. Four – on a HUMMER in Detroit – can’t be found anywhere else.

Bridgestone Firestone North American Tire, LLC (BFNT), in cooperation with General Motors (GM), has designed a Dueler concept tire for the HUMMER HX concept sport utility truck, introduced by GM at the 2008 North American International Auto Show (NAIAS).

The 35-inch tall tires, engineered specifically for the HX, are mounted to the HUMMER concept’s 20-inch rims and feature a striking, deep-skid directional tread pattern with large, stiff lugs that provide excellent traction on a variety of driving surfaces. The tread lugs, stretching halfway down the sidewall, offer extra grip in deep sand, snow and mud and protect the tire from punctures during off-road activities, such as rock crawling.

“Conceptual programs allow our designers to extend beyond the boundaries of contemporary thinking and express our brand as it relates to a specific vehicle in a dynamic new way,” said Michael Martini, President, Consumer OE Tire Sales, BFNT. “Working with the best and brightest minds at HUMMER to bring this tire to fruition was a particularly rewarding experience. The HX concept is a ‘no-doubt-about-it’ show-stopper and an exceptional representative of the Dueler-brand family of light truck tires.”

Martini explained that GM chose to work with BFNT on the HUMMER HX project due to past conceptual program collaborations. BFNT is also a primary original equipment supplier to GM with Bridgestone- and Firestone-brand tire fitments on many current production vehicles.

As well, 33-inch tall Bridgestone Dueler A/T tires are standard on new HUMMER H3’s sporting the ZM6 Off-Road Adventure package. The 2008 H3 Alpha was recently named ‘2008 Four Wheeler of the Year’ by the editors of Four Wheeler magazine.