Goodyear Completes $650 Million Private Secured Notes Offering; Repays U.S. Term Loan, Reduces U.S. Revolving Credit Facilities

AKRON, Ohio, March 15 -- The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company today announced that it has successfully completed a private offering of $650 million of senior secured notes.

The proceeds of the notes were used to repay the remaining amount outstanding under the company's U.S. term loan facility, to reduce its $750 million U.S. revolving credit facility to $680 million and for general corporate purposes.

The notes, due 2011, consist of $450 million of 11 percent senior secured notes and $200 million of senior secured floating rate notes, which pay a variable interest rate of eight percentage points over six month LIBOR. The notes are secured by junior liens on certain of the collateral securing the company's senior secured U.S. credit facilities.

"This financing, along with our recently completed $650 million term loan, have enabled us to meet our goal of refinancing the U.S. Term Loan before April of this year and avoids the milestone fee that would have been payable under our restructured credit facilities put in place last April," said Robert W. Tieken, executive vice president and chief financial officer.

Goodyear is the world's largest tire company. The company manufactures tires, engineered rubber products and chemicals in more than 85 facilities in 28 countries. It has marketing operations in almost every country in the world. Goodyear employs approximately 88,000 people worldwide.

Certain information contained in this press release may constitute forward-looking statements for purposes of the safe harbor provisions of The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Actual results may differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements as a result of various factors. Additional factors that may cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated by such forward-looking statements are discussed in the company's Form 10-K for the year ended Dec. 31, 2002, and Form 10-Q for the quarter ended Sept. 30, 2003, and Form 8-K dated Feb. 11, 2004, which are on file with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In addition, any forward-looking statements represent our estimates only as of today and should not be relied upon as representing our estimates as of any subsequent date. While we may elect to update forward-looking statements at some point in the future, we specifically disclaim any obligation to do so, even if our estimates change.