Good morning and welcome to this week’s Friday Brief.
We are pleased to announce that the charity auction at the MTA annual dinner raised an impressive £14,707 for the President’s Charity the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers Association. MTA President Guy Mollart, said “We are pleased to have raised such an impressive total for the President’s Charity at the Annual MTA Dinner. This is a very generous contribution by MTA members and their guests for the REME Charity for ex-servicemen and women which, we hope, this reaffirms our strong links and the respect we have for the UK’s Armed Forces.”
MACH 2016 is a mere few weeks away, stay up to date with all the exhibition goings on via our social media on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook, find out how in the story below.
Staying with the Armed Forces, the UK Armed Forces Covenant brand was re-launched recently by the Prime Minister. If any member currently uses the old Armed Forces Corporate Covenant logos or the Employer Recognition Scheme logo, MoD request that you to update it with the new versions. Details on how to do this can be found in the below story.
The European Society for Precision Engineering & Nanotechnology (euspen) will be hosting its prestigious 16th Annual International Conference and Exhibition 30th May to 3rd June 2016 at the University of Nottingham. MTA members are entitled to a 10% discount to the conference and exhibition.
Staying with Euspen their Special Interest Group on Thermal Issues are holding a meeting on March 17-18, 2016 in Prague, Czech Republic, two of our associate members, Huddersfield University and Cranfield University, have contributed technical papers. Also, MTA member, Renishaw’s Mr Nick Jones, is providing a meeting keynote address on thermal issues in additive manufacturing. Find out how to attend in the story below.
The MTA is often gets contacted by companies or individuals looking to explore commercial opportunities with our members. We have three such opportunities within this week’s Brief that could be of interest, to find out more and if you could be involved, please see the story below.
Can we also give you a quick reminder about the MTA business survey which is open now, we would really appreciate all members taking the time to fill it, you can access it here http://www.mta.org.uk/mta-business-survey-jan16.
The key economic data this week was the manufacturing output data released by the ONS; while the overall headlines were fairly downbeat, as always, the real interest lies in the detailed figures. While total manufacturing output was down a little on 2014, both the Automotive and Aerospace sectors reached new record high levels of output in the 4th quarter of 2015, both for the quarter and the year as a whole - although the separate data series only go back to 1997, an aggregate which covers all Transport Equipment goes back to 1948 and shows that the latest figures are a record even over 67 years! The counter-point to this, as it has been for some time, is the very weak Machinery industry where the end of 2015 saw another fall in output which took activity almost back to where it was at the depth of the recession.
That’s all for this week, we’ll be back next Friday. Only enter text, no images or links