Freudenberg-NOK Earns Record Number of Safety Awards

    PLYMOUTH, Mich., April 3 The Rubber Manufacturers
Association (RMA) recently presented Freudenberg-NOK production facilities
with a total of eight 2000 Safety and Health Improvement Program (SHIP) Awards
-- more than any other company.  The facilities earned the awards for
achieving dramatic improvements in employee safety and health over the past
year.
    Honored with the RMA SHIP Excellence Award were Freudenberg-NOK facilities
in Bristol, N.H.; Scottsburg, Ind.; Spencer, Iowa; and Purcellville, Va.  This
award is given to companies that achieve a lost workday incidence rate that is
at least 75 percent better than the overall RMA plant average.
    Freudenberg-NOK plants located in Scottsburg, Ind.; Henderson, Nev.; and
Bristol and Manchester, N.H., won RMA SHIP Improvement Awards for reducing
their lost workday incidence rate by at least 20 percent over the previous
year.
    "As a perennial winner of SHIP Awards, we are extremely proud to have
received a record number this year -- which underscores our ongoing commitment
to safety," said Joseph C. Day, Freudenberg-NOK Chairman and CEO.  "It's part
of our lean culture to strive for perfect safety performance, just as we
strive for perfection in our products and processes."
    The majority of the company's U.S. manufacturing facilities have received
SHIP Awards, including plants in Santa Ana, Calif.; Cleveland and LaGrange,
Ga.; and Bensenville, Ligonier, and Morristown, Ind.
    Founded in 1915, the Rubber Manufacturers Association is the national
trade association of the rubber industry.  Its members include more than 100
companies and affiliated organizations which produce thousands of finished
rubber and tire products.
    Plymouth, Mich.-based Freudenberg-NOK is part of the Freudenberg and NOK
Group Companies, which have total annual sales of nearly $7 billion.  With
global automotive sales of approximately $4 billion, the Freudenberg and NOK
Group ranks among the 15 largest OEM automotive suppliers (per Crain's Detroit
Business) and is one of only eight in the top 100 that has global balance in
each of the three major automotive markets -- Asia, Europe and North America
(according to Automotive News).
    Through a global network of facilities spanning 27 countries with some
25,000 automotive employees worldwide, the supplier group offers its
automotive customers globally integrated products, including sealing packages
for transmissions, engines, brakes, axles and steering, NVH (noise, vibration
and harshness) components and packages, and all rubber, plastic and PTFE
components for suspension, electrical and fuel systems.
    The Freudenberg and NOK Group also offers an extensive portfolio of
precision-molded products for the aerospace, appliance, business machine,
fluid power, marine, medical, off-highway equipment and recreational vehicle
markets.  For more information, visit the Freudenberg-NOK web site at
http://www.freudenberg-nok.com