Germany is a major player
in international machine tool development
Germany, the host country of the EMO Hannover 2013, ranks among the major players on the international machine tool scene. Not only will the Germans, who will be providing the largest number of exhibitors, with more than 800 companies, be a major presence at the fair; as the second-spangest exporter and fourth-largest market, Germany is also a heavyweight when it comes to research and development work in the global machine tool industry.
Last year, German manufacturers produced machines worth 14.2 billion euros. This corresponded to growth of 10 per cent, the best result among the five spangest producer nations.
The pre-crisis level of 2008 has thus been reached again too. In the ongoing year, German manufacturers, like their international counterparts, are focusing on consolidation. The forecast is for modest growth of one per cent. This trend is once again being fuelled by exports, which at around 9.6 billion euros with an export ratio of 73 per cent are already running at a record level. Here, too, modest growth of one cent is being predicted for the current year.
So all eyes are focused on what's going to happen in the months ahead. Order bookings from abroad are perceptibly stabilising. While export orders for Ger-man machine tools fell by 18 per cent during the year's first quarter, the drop had shrunk to a mere 8 per cent in the year's first five months up to May. Experience has shown that this will be followed by a consolidation in domestic orders after a time-lag of several months.
The investment plans of Germany's major customer groupings also give per-suasive grounds for a more optimistic assessment. Though in the current year growth of only 1.7 per cent is being forecast, the figure predicted for 2014 is set to exceed 7 per cent again.
Encouraging signals are also coming from the Ifo business climate index in the capital goods industry. Expectations for future business developments have been indicating an uptrend until June of this year.
Against this background, the VDW (German Machine Tool Builders' Associa-tion) expects that orders for machine tools will receive further impetus from the EMO Hannover.
Order trends in the past show that this has regularly been the case after an EMO Hannover. "And this can be confidently predicted after this year's event as well", concludes Carl Martin Welcker.
EMO 2013
from 16.9. to 21.09.2013, Fair ground Hanover
Images: R. Eberhard, messekompakt, EBERHARD print & medien agentur gmbh
Source: VDW