Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co (GT) Q4 2019 Earnings Call Transcript

Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co (GT) Q4 2019 Earnings Call Transcript

I'm joined today by Rich Kramer, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer and Darren Wells, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer.. The working capital initiatives we implemented earlier in the year helped drive more than a 40% increase in our cash flow from operations during the quarter.. Unit volume increased 2% driven by growth in the high margin premium segments of the market.. Replacement volume increased 4%, driven by double-digit growth in Brazil.. So while I feel really good about these positives, we have to be realistic about the challenges we see in the industry environment, as well as the issues we have in distribution affecting our European consumer replacement business.. OE volume continued to be negatively impacted by lower light vehicle production and the downturn in the commercial truck cycle.. In China, we continue to face a very challenging OE environment and the timing of a significant recovery continues to be pushed out with some forecasters expecting a third year of decline with a significant deterioration in the first quarter.. While the challenging industry environment clearly affected our results this year, I'm not happy with how our EMEA business performed in 2019.. We're focusing our efforts on developing a