Good afternoon and welcome to this week’s edition of the Friday Brief, hopefully you all had a fantastic Easter break.
The MTA and MTC have teamed up to put together an exciting seminar programme around Bridging the Skills Gap within the manufacturing industry. This seminar takes place on 12th May at the MTC in Coventry. The half day seminar is FREE, just email events@mta.org.uk to register your interest. Along with the seminar programme there will also be a networking lunch provided, as well as tours of MTC’s fantastic facilities. Spaces are limited so book your place today.
We are delighted to announce that we will be sponsoring tool kits for The Girl-Kart Grand Prix, Friday 4th September 2015. This event is organised by charity London Play who specialise in creating outdoor spaces for children to play in and there are plenty of opportunities for MTA members to get involved.
This week new rules around parental leave have been introduced, for full details on how this will affect your employees and your company please visit this link for an overview https://www.gov.uk/shared-parental-leave-and-pay/overview.
The 10th International Conference on Additive Manufacturing & 3D Printing is on 7th - 9th July 2015. Online registration is easy using our booking system so be sure of your place at this key event and register now by clicking HERE. Register by 8th May and receive a £70 discount off the standard delegate fee (standard delegate fee £420 + vat).
Rősler UK at their premises in Knowsley, Merseyside to ‘be inspired’ as they celebrate the re-opening of their demonstration and test facility on either Wednesday 22nd April or Thursday 23rd April 2015. To find out more, including details of the full programme and to register for the event, please contact Sandra Banks on 0151 482 0444 or by email at: rosler-uk@rosler.com for a registration form.
MTA Members offered special rate for Moulding Expo in Stuttgart, for further information on Moulding Expo 2015 please read the below story or to register interest for this event and this discounted package please email Steve Lindsey steve@lincolnwest.co.uk or telephone 01732 525950.
Just a quick reminder that the March edition of the MTA Business Survey is still open for members participation; the online form is at http://www.mta.org.uk/mta-business-survey-mar2015.
We have a new member of staff who has just joined the MTA team Dorothy Straw will be the new PA to CEO James Selka. Dorothy started with the MTA in March 2015 and provides diary management for the CEO.
In Economic news this week, overall, the manufacturing sector of the economy is doing OK - nothing spectacular, but there is some gentle growth. The data for the Engineering sub-sector is affected by what look like some dodgy numbers for the Machinery industry which, if the figures are to be believed shows a sharp fall in output which is larger than the decline in the extraction of oil & gas - while much of the equipment for the oil & gas industry is defined as part of the Machinery industry, this is a wide ranging sector and it is hard to believe that this is the whole story. Also, there is much better news in other parts of the Engineering spectrum, with both Aerospace and Automotive output showing strong growth and even the Metal Products industry, which has been in the doldrums for some time, is showing signs of expansion in the most recent data.