Good morning and welcome to this week’s Friday Brief.
Firstly, we’re pleased to announce that The Close Brothers SME apprenticeship programme - supported by the AMRC Training Centre and the Manufacturing Technologies Association has been extended. This is the fourth year of the Close Brothers SME Apprentice programme, which will help pay for 20 apprentices in the Sheffield City Region area to learn their skills at the AMRC Training Centre in Rotherham. The scheme will help smaller businesses in the region secure the skills they need for future growth. Find out more below.
150 Chief Executives, including the CEO’s of some of Britain’s biggest engineering employers as well as those of some of its most innovative smaller companies have today written to the Prime Minister to express their concern about the possibility of a ‘No deal’ scenario. The signatories make it clear that this outcome would cause enormous disruption to UK industry and risk substantial economic damage to the UK.
The SoPHE Young Engineers Award is given annually each November at the Society of Public Health Engineer’s dinner in London. The aim of the award is to provide a focus on the next generation of engineers within the field of public health engineering. Find out how you can get involved below.
The International Manufacturing Technology Show is one of the largest industrial trade shows in the world, and it will take place in Chicago, Illinois, USA from 10 to 15 September 2018. MTA members get free admission to the exhibition using the discount code within the Brief. So, if you’re attending please let know by email James.fudge@mta.org.uk.
The European Parliament released a non-binding resolution about 3D printing on 3 July, questioning the suitability of current EU regulations. Europe needs a more measured approach to avoid premature regulation that could negatively impact innovation in the EU.
On July 17, at the Japan-EU summit in Tokyo, Japan and the EU signed the free trade agreement, for which an agreement in principle was reached last year. Although this agreement sends a message to the world that the EU is shaping the global trade and advocates for fair and open trade, we do not believe it will be very helpful for the European machine tool manufacturers. Find out more below.
The ONS recently published a raft of data on productivity and we take a look at the overall highlights in the economic news section this week. The UK continues to see productivity growing at a much slower rate than before the recession, although this focus tends to be on the whole economy series; manufacturing seems to do better, but also has a much more volatile trend, mainly from the output side of the productivity equation (output per hour worked). The news item includes a link the ONS web-site which has a quick calculator for companies to see how their productivity compares with the rest of the economy. Also this week, the good news over growth in the US market for machine tools and cutting tools continues, with both series now running at more than +10% on a rolling 12-month trend.
That’s all for this week, we’ll be back next Friday with more industry news, until then enjoy your weekend.
