Falken is a brand of passenger car, light truck, and medium truck tires owned by the Japanese company Sumitomo Rubber Industries (SRI). It was launched in its native country of Japan in 1983, and was introduced to the North American market two years later and in Europe in 1988. Falken has now become a stand-alone brand that focuses on UHP (ultra high performance) products while utilizing professional motorsports to further develop and improve products for worldwide distribution.
Sumitomo Rubber North America, Inc., formerly known as Falken Tire Corporation, is the corporate headquarters in Rancho Cucamonga, California, with a West Coast distribution center in Ontario, California. Additional Falken Tire distribution locations include warehouses in Illinois, Florida, New Jersey, and Texas.
In June 2015, Sumitomo and Goodyear announced that they would dissolve their worldwide partnership. As part of the deal, Sumitomo bought Goodyear’s Dunlop Tires North America, which included a manufacturing plant in Tonawanda, near Buffalo, New York. The plant, rebranded as Sumitomo Rubber USA, began to produce Falken-branded tires in January 2016. As of 2025, that Buffalo, New York manufacturing plant has closed. [1]
History
Timeline
1983: The Falken brand is created as a high performance brand of Ohtsu Rubber & Tire in Japan.[2]
1985: Started Falken Motorsports & U.S. Distribution.
1988: Team Falken wins the Mirage Cup International series.
1988: Falken introduces the Sincera Tire.
1988: Falken Tyre Europe GmbH is founded in Offenbach am Main, Germany.
1990: The N1 6hour Endurance Sugu 400 km GT-R R32 class winner.
2018: Falken became a sponsor of German Basketball League team EWE Baskets.
2018: Falken Azenis FK510 wins the Wheels Magazine Tyre Test in Australia.[10]
Motorsports
Falken Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R and BMW M6 GT3 in one of the 2018 Nürburgring VLN races.
Falken has participated in many motorsport activities, including the Tudor United Sports Car Championship IMSA, the former American Le Mans Series, British Drift Championship, Irish Drift Championship, Drift Allstars European Series with driver James Deane, Formula D, Nürburgring 24 Hours, and International Drift Series. Drivers for the IMSA GT Class were Wolf Henzler and Bryan Sellers, in which they co-piloted a Porsche 911 RSR. Sponsored drivers for the Formula Drift competition were Daijiro Yoshihara, Justin Pawlak, James Deane, Piotr Wiecek, Matt Field, and Aurimas "Odi" Bakchis. Current drivers in the British Drift Championship competition are Matt Carter, Paul Cheshire and Alan Green. Drivers sponsored in 2010 International Drift Series were Remmo Niezen, Lars Verbraeken and Lennard Wanders.[11]
Falken has sponsored racing series such as ALMS and domestic championships like Super Taikyu, 24 Hours Nürburgring and drifting series such as Formula D and D1 Grand Prix. Falken was previously the title sponsor of the British Drift Championship until 2010 when Maxxis became the title sponsor.
Since at least 2009, Falken Tire have also a team of spokesmodels that attend to all of the American Le Mans Series and Formula Drift motorsport events.[12][13]
^"Motorsport News". press.porsche.com. The Gary Stock Company + Porsche Cars North America. Archived from the original on 20 December 2016. Retrieved 16 June 2017.
