Nokian Cheated On Tire Tests With Custom-Made Ringers

8 years, 8 months ago - 1 March 2016, Autoblog

Tire maker Nokian Renkaat created custom versions of its products that performed better in comparison tests, according to Bloomberg citing a report from Finnish newspaper Kauppalehti. The paper made these claims based on internal emails and sources at the company.

Nokian CEO Ari Lehtoranta admitted to using custom tires in tests before 2014, which was also prior to him taking over as the corporation's boss. The Finnish newspaper alleged the deception began in 2005, according to Reuters. Lehtoranta claims the company has stopped giving out modified versions of its products for evaluations.

Nokian released a statement (below) about the Finnish report, and the company claimed this was an industry-wide issue. "In past years, when the testing organisations asked manufacturers to send them tyres for the tests, activities in the industry were dubious," it said. "On our behalf, we apologise and regret the mistakes we have made in the past."

The fallout from the report caused Nokian's stock to drop the most in two years, and it decreased as much as 9.6 percent at one point in the day, Bloomberg reports. Shares are down nearly six percent as of this writing.

So far, the Finnish report only appears to apply to tire tests in Europe.