After 35 years manufacturing in Elizabethtown, Akebono Brake announced plans Friday to close its plant on Ring Road late 2025.
An industry-related website says the decision impacts 629 employees locally.
The company began informing staff as first shift employees reported to work before dawn. Letters explaining the closure also were delivered by email to vendors.
A letter from Yasuhiro Miyaji, president and CEO of Akebone Brake Industry Company, said the board of directors “resolved to reduce the business of its U.S. subsidiary” and close one of its two manufacturing sites in December of 2025.
Reducing its North American manufacturing was central to what the company calls a business turnaround plan adopted in September 2019. Three months later it shifted to a one-plant U.S. operation in Elizabethtown with the closure of plants in Clarksville, Tennessee, and Columbia, South Carolina.
A site still exists in Glasgow.
The company’s most recent sales data shows annual sales of 41.9 million yen or $280 million in the fiscal year ending March 31, 2023, according to thebrakereport.com. In the same period, the business reported an annual loss of more than $24.69 million, the website said.
Previously known as Ambrake, Akebono manufactures disc brakes, drum brakes and high-performance disc brakes for automobiles and for a time operated a North American headquarters adjacent to the Elizabethtown plant.
Source: NE
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