American manufacturing is either on the cusp of a remarkable renaissance or in the throes of a long-term death spiral. And there’s plenty of data and anecdotal evidence to satisfy both views.

Economic data on manufacturing activity were mixed last week, but for those who are optimists, there were also signs that demand, output and hiring might accelerate moving forward. Along those lines, the Institute for Supply Management’s (ISM) Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index accelerated to a two-year high in December. It was the second consecutive increase in the headline number, mirroring the jump in business confidence seen in other economic indicators since the election.

As part of the Manufacturing USA initiative, the Energy Department has announced its new Reducing Embodied-energy and Decreasing Emissions (REMADE) Institute, which will be headquartered in Rochester, New York, and led by the Sustainable Manufacturing Innovation Alliance.  REMADE will leverage up to $70 million in federal funding, subject to appropriations, and will be matched by $70 million in private cost-share commitments from over 100 partners.

The U.S. economy added 156,000 new jobs in December, the Labor Department reported Friday, slightly below economists’ expectations. Yet wages rose 2.9 percent from last December, the strongest increase in more than seven years and evidence that economic growth is finally translating into gains for workers.

Few would suggest that Massachusetts’ unemployment rate dropping below 3 percent, as it did in November for the first time in more than 15 years, is a bad thing. But some economists are waving caution flags about an increasingly tight labor market in which key industries are finding it more difficult to secure the highly skilled employees they need to continue flourishing.

The United States system for taxing businesses is a mess. If there’s one thing nearly everyone can agree upon, it is that. The current corporate income tax manages the weird trick of both taxing companies at a higher statutory rate than other advanced countries while collecting less money, as a percentage of the overall economy, than most of them. It is infinitely complicated and it gives companies incentives to borrow too much money and move operations to countries with lower tax rates.

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV’s $1 billion plan to build in the U.S. three new Jeeps and a Ram pickup now produced in Mexico won plaudits from President-elect Donald Trump as he pressures the auto industry to hire and manufacture above the border. The automaker will add 2,000 jobs at factories in Michigan and Ohio, the Italian-American company said Sunday ahead of the Detroit auto show. It will retool the facilities by 2020 and add the Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer sport utility vehicles and a pickup model to its lineup. After improvements to a plant in Warren, Michigan, the site will be able to assemble Ram HD trucks now produced in Saltillo, Mexico.

BMW has committed itself to launching its iNext self-driving, electric and fully connected car by the year 2021. It already has the i3 electric car and the i8 plug-in hybrid sports car. In order to meet its target for the iNext model, the company is planning to have approximately 40 autonomous test vehicles on the roads in Munich, Germany later this year.

Sami Haddadin wants to apply safety features normally found on expensive systems affordable to anyone using robots around people.

China’s Midea said it will complete its takeover of German robotics maker Kuka in the first half of January after the United States authorities gave the deal a green light.

Manufacturing Business Technology
(VIDEO) Loup Ventures Managing Partner Gene Munster discusses his new venture and his research-driven approach to venture capital.

Effective field service is about proactively managing your workforce and inventory in order to meet the constantly sliding scale of customer expectations. As a result, field service organizations are constantly looking to improve on the key metrics to better serve customers: first-time fix rate (FTF), mean time to service (MTTS) and mean time to repair (MTTR).

3D metal printing materials useable by the Metal X include, 17-4 Stainless Steel, 303 Stainless Steel, 6061 Aluminum (Beta), 7075 Aluminum (Beta), A-2 Tool Steel (Beta), D-2 Tool Steel (Beta), IN Alloy (Inconel) 625 (Beta) and Titanium Ti-6Al-4V (Beta). This is an incredible range of metal materials that not even some of the more established existing industrial machines can accomplish.

Mining company Rio Tinto has deployed a fleet of 73 self-driving trucks that reportedly haul payloads at a cost 15 percent less than those operated by human drivers. Mining is just one of many industries seeing humans replaced by automated systems, a trend that will likely lead to widespread unemployment in the future.

It was an up and down year for commodities but things ultimately finished in the black. 

Learn what is required for the design of an optimum gear set and the importance of the coordinated effort of the gear design engineer, the gear metallurgist, and the bearing system engineer. Investigate gear‐related problems, failures and improved processing procedures.

After a strong 2016, most West Michigan manufacturers are looking ahead to this year with optimism that they will continue to grow as the economy expands. Overall, the majority of manufacturing executives interviewed by MiBiz over the last month have expressed bullishness that the industry will continue to expand, particularly if the incoming Trump administration follows through on some of its campaign promises for pro-business policies and deregulation.  

As many of us reflect on 2016 and the impact the political and economic climate has had on the manufacturing industry, the new year is a good time for us to look ahead and prepare for all eventualities 2017 may bring. The past year’s uncertainty meant that many companies delayed making investment decisions or large capital expenditures preferring to take a more cautionary path forward until a clear Brexit process has been agreed.