Hiring to maintain growth pace in fourth quarter
EPA compliance centers to help cut environmental costs
IMTS survey reveals manufacturer concerns
Jobless claims rise in recent week
Appliance maker faces religious discrimination suit
Industrial production inches up in August
Nissan hires Toyota exec to head product quality
Semiconductor vendors to experience rapid consolidation
Fab labs manufacture inspiration in developing countries
Machine tool consumption declines in July
Anderson Pump & Process purchases UMISCO
IT hiring turns soft
Eye and face protection standard available from ISEA
Are you ready for some football?
Timken, UAW agree to contract

Hiring to maintain growth pace in fourth quarter
The hiring pace for the fourth quarter will remain consistent with the past two quarters, but much improved from a year ago across the United States, according to the latest Manpower Employment Outlook Survey, conducted quarterly by Manpower Inc.

Of the 16,000 U.S. employers surveyed, 28 percent plan to add staff in the fourth quarter, while 7 percent expect to reduce their payrolls, creating a Net Employment Outlook of 21 percent.

Sixty percent of employers surveyed anticipate no change in staff levels for the coming quarter, and 5 percent are unsure of their hiring plans. The seasonally adjusted employment outlook for the final months of 2004 is the same as it was in the second and third quarters. The job forecast remained at a respectable level for three quarters, and it is decidedly more positive than a year ago when the outlook was half as strong.

"U.S. employers have predicted solid employment activity for the past six months, and they expect to sustain that level of hiring through the end of the year," said Jeffrey A. Joerres, chairman and CEO of Manpower Inc. "Hiring plans remain the most upbeat they have been since the hiring boom of the late 1990s that continued into the new millennium. The survey's history reveals only two other stretches when employers planned to hire at a healthier pace than in the current survey: the late 1970s and the middle months of 1984."

Employers in seven of the 10 industry sectors surveyed plan to keep hiring activity levels relatively consistent with the July to September period. These sectors include non-durable goods manufacturing, transportation/public utilities, wholesale/retail trade, finance/insurance/real estate, services, public administration and mining. Durable goods manufacturers are slightly more confident about hiring than they were in the third quarter, while job prospects in construction and education are expected to soften slightly.

"Optimism among durable and non-durable goods manufacturers has been mounting throughout 2004. The manufacturing sectors, along with wholesale/retail trade, are the bright spots in the fourth quarter survey. These employers are more confident about hiring than those in the other sectors," said Joerres.

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EPA compliance centers to help cut environmental costs
The Environmental Protection Agency will launch 13 sector-specific Compliance Assistance Centers to address real-world issues in language used by the regulated entities.

Through Web sites, telephone assistance lines, fax-back systems and e-mail discussion groups, the centers aim to help businesses, local governments and federal facilities understand federal environmental requirements and save money through pollution prevention techniques.

Once a year, the centers survey their users -- even first-time visitors -- on how well they meet that goal. The results of the surveys help the centers provide resources for environmental compliance.

Click on the center sites at www.assistancecenters.net and take a short survey. Surveys should not take more than three minutes to complete. The centers are offering incentives to respondents.

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IMTS survey reveals manufacturer concerns
A man-on-the-street survey profiles the business concerns of visitors to IMTS -- International Manufacturing Technology Show, the largest industrial exposition in the Americas.

Companies appear to be benefiting from the manufacturing revival to varying degrees. When asked, "How much has your company benefited from the manufacturing revival?", on a scale of 5 (high) to 1 (low), 23 percent of respondents answered 5, 15 percent answered 4, 23 percent answered 3, 22 percent answered 2, and 17 percent answered 1.

On Monday, year-to-date machine tool consumption in 2004 was reported up 39.3 percent compared with 2003 by the American Machine Tool Distributors' Association and the Association For Manufacturing Technology. Concern with foreign competition is high.

When asked "How concerned is your company about low-wage foreign competition?", on a scale of 5 (high) to 1 (low), 48 percent answered 5, 5 percent answered 4, 17 percent answered 3, 10 percent answered 2 and 20 percent answered 1.

In regards to whether the Bush administration is doing enough to help U.S. firms compete in global markets, nearly two-thirds of respondents answered "no."

Respondents split 50/50 on the presence of a skilled-help shortage. Individual respondents identified shortages in such skills as electronic technicians, machinists and machine operators, quality control, welders, and toolmakers.

Launched in 1927, IMTS has become the largest industrial trade exhibition in the Americas and among the largest in the world. Then and now, the show exhibited the latest technology at the time. IMTS is held every other year at McCormick Place in Chicago. Recognized as one of the world's preeminent stages for introducing and selling manufacturing equipment and technology, IMTS attracts more than 100,000 visitors from about 40 countries.

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Jobless claims rise in recent week
New claims for unemployment insurance increased 16,000 to 333,000 for the week ended Sept. 11, according to the Labor Department. The four-week moving average was 338,000, unchanged from the previous week.

The four-week moving average is generally considered by economists to be the more reliable of the two because it smoothes out week-to-week volatility. Both rates remained below 400,000, which is the level economists use to define a weak labor market and a stable one.

Continuing claims for unemployment insurance decreased 3,000 to 2.9 million for the week ended Sept. 4. Continuing claims are those older than two weeks.

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Appliance maker faces religious discrimination suit
Whirlpool Corp. is facing a discrimination suit for refusing to let Muslim workers leave the production line for the sunset prayer. Nine plaintiffs have filed suit against the La Vergne, Tenn., appliance manufacturer.

The case is fairly simple. The Muslim faith calls for five daily prayers, one of which falls in the middle of a nightly production shift at Whirlpool. 

Assembly worker Ibrahim Farah told the U.S. District Court in Nashville the company violated federal and state laws by not accommodating his religious beliefs, which turned his work environment hostile.

The company maintains that to run a lean manufacturing facility, production workers cannot leave the line for five to seven minutes for prayer. Whirlpool is expected to present evidence showing that lean manufacturing facilities require flow through a factory, and this flow would be disrupted by workers who leave the production line.

This case is expected to last quite a while as the plaintiffs bring in numerous religious experts and Whirlpool brings in numerous lean manufacturing experts.

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Industrial production inches up in August
Growth in industrial production slowed to 0.1 percent in August following a sizable 0.6 percent gain in July, according to the Federal Reserve. The August rate surprised many economists, who predicted a 0.5 percent gain for the month.

At 116.6 percent of its 1997 average, industrial production in August was 5.2 percent above its level a year earlier. Capacity utilization for total industry was unchanged in August, at 77.3 percent, a rate 3.8 percentage points below its 1972-2003 average.

An increase of 1.6 percent in the production of durable goods primarily reflected a sharp increase in automotive products. Motor vehicle assemblies rose 500,000 units from July, to a 12 million unit pace (annual rate).

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"Doug is a strong addition to our management team. He replaces Mo Brunelle, who retired Sept. 1 after 23 years with Nissan," said Dan Gaudette, Nissan North America senior vice president of North American manufacturing and quality assurance. "We've been aware of Mo's impending retirement, and that gave us the time and opportunity to search internally and externally to find the best person. Doug's work in quality, engineering and manufacturing is the right mix of experience and expertise Nissan requires in this position."

Betts worked for Toyota since 1997 and was responsible for all quality-related activities, including quality engineering, supplier quality assurance and inspection operations. Prior to his work at Toyota, Doug held management positions in production and quality for Michelin North America Inc.

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Semiconductor vendors to experience rapid consolidation
Within 10 years, 40 percent of today's semiconductor vendors are likely to leave the industry, according to Gartner Inc.

Analysts identified five trends that will lead to significant changes in the industry. These trends include increasing device integration, the increasing scale and size of manufacturing, the shift from business to consumer markets, the increasing role of service providers, and new and disruptive technologies.

Increasing device integration is the first and most fundamental of the trends. This gives tremendous benefits in terms of increased chip speed, lower power dissipation, greater functionality per chip, lower system cost and physically smaller-end equipment.

"Increasing costs and complexity of design, increased system content and greater flexibility means fewer vendors will have the capability to supply chips in the future," said Jim Tully, vice president and chief of research for Gartner's emerging technologies and semiconductor group.

"The number of semiconductor vendors has risen steadily from about 120 vendors in the mid-1980s, to roughly 550 in 2003. Within 10 years, the industry will experience significant consolidation."

The second trend concerns increasing costs and increasing scale of semiconductor manufacturing. Fabrication plants are becoming extremely expensive, and next generation fabrication operations will inevitably become too expensive for most existing companies.

"To survive, large and costly fabs will need to achieve significant economies of scale, and they will require high volumes of chip production, preferably standard chips that can be produced in a standardized environment with large batch sizes. These standard chips will then be customized after manufacture for specific applications," Tully said. "This will result in fewer chip manufacturers in the future, but it won't result in higher chip prices because the industry is capital-intensive and is highly competitive."

The third trend relates to the growing importance of consumer markets. By 2013, more than 50 percent of chip sales will be for equipment markets targeted at consumers. One of the challenges for vendors is that the consumer market can be unpredictable. It can be hard to identify what consumers will want.

"Consumer markets are normally high volume and the overall market size is large," Tully said. "However, margins on consumer products are very low and the value of individual product categories can be surprisingly small. The falling number of chips per application, because of integration, is playing its part in dampening the growth in these applications."

In the past many semiconductor products were stand-alone, however the industry must prepare for the increasing role of service providers. Increasingly, large numbers of equipment are being interconnected, both over the Internet and in LANs. This makes them accessible to companies offering upgrades, content and other services.

New technologies have driven the semiconductor industry from the beginning, and new technologies will continue to drive the industry. Most of these have been incremental technology developments. However, disruptive technologies will have a significant and unpredictable effect on the industry.

Examples of disruptive technologies include inkjet processes, light-emitting polymers, carbon nanotubes, molecular transistors and protein-DNA logic.

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Fab labs manufacture inspiration in developing countries 
Fluorescent pink key chains may not immediately call to mind "high-tech," but for students in Sekondi-Takoradi, Ghana, key chains designed and manufactured by their own hands on modern fabrication tools represent the first link from the high-tech world to the world they live in.

In July and August, a team from MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms (CBA) deployed its sixth field "fab lab," based on the campus of the Takoradi Technical Institute (TTI) in the sister cities of Sekondi and Takoradi in Ghana's southwest corner. Members included CBA program manager Sherry Lassiter, CBA's director, Neil Gershenfeld, and graduate students Amy Sun and Aisha Walcott.

With about $20,000 worth of equipment, a fab lab is a hands-on laboratory that provides the technology to let people build just about anything from inexpensive and readily available materials. The goal of the fab lab is to help people use advanced information technologies to develop and produce solutions to local problems.

Beyond key chains, the Ghana lab is working on practical projects including antennas and radios for wireless networks and solar-powered machinery for cooking, cooling and cutting. Each of these activities was developed in collaboration with local users, ranging from street children to tribal chiefs, to address the most important local needs.

"End of second week...enthusiasm as seen in [the] first week has not waned but increased," Sun wrote in an e-mail from a local Internet café. "Students are taking [or have] just completed their exams and are coming to the lab begging to take a class or get trained on the equipment. Begging. No, really, actually begging."

The idea for the fab labs arose from CBA research on the ultimate "personal fabricator" -- a machine that can make any machine, including itself -- supported by a "wildly oversubscribed" course at MIT called "How to Make (Almost) Anything," according to Gershenfeld.

CBA is exploring the interface between computer science and physical science, funded by a $13.8 million Information Technology Research award from the National Science Foundation (NSF).

"Instead of bringing information technology to the masses, the fab labs bring information technology development to the masses," Gershenfeld said. "For our education and outreach efforts, rather than telling people about what we’re doing, we thought we’d help them do it themselves. We've been pulled around the world by the voracious demand we've found each time we've deployed a fab lab."

The fab labs provide an accessible approximation of the tools CBA has on campus, and over time, Gershenfeld said, components of the labs will be replaced with components made in the labs until eventually the fab labs themselves are self-reproducing.

Each fab lab comes equipped with computer-controlled fabrication tools, open-source computer-aided design and manufacturing software and associated electronic components and test equipment. Capabilities include a laser cutter for 2-D and 3-D structures, a sign cutter for plotting interconnects and electromagnetics, a 3-D precision milling machine for applications such as making surface-mount circuit boards and programming tools for low-cost, high-speed embedded microcontrollers.

"We are producing key chains by the pocketful," Sun wrote. "At first blush this might not sound profound; however, most students show up in our lab with zero to very little computer skills. They so desperately want fluorescent pink key chains that they eagerly spend hours in the process."

Besides the lack of computer skills and limited Internet connectivity, the Ghana fab lab highlights other practical challenges in bringing high-tech to developing areas. For example, with humidity near 100 percent and no air conditioning, the cardboard, paper and card stock used to prototype objects turn soggy. And in a country with a 2003 per capita income of $320, even the cheapest of materials can be hard to come by. One of the earliest tasks for Sun was to seek out readily available local supplies, such as veneer wood, coconut tree bark and rubber.

"The most advanced technologies are needed in some of the least developed places," Gershenfeld said. The Center for Bits and Atoms and its fab labs share the goal of "bringing together the best features of the bits of new digital worlds with the atoms of our physical world."

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Machine tool consumption declines in July
July U.S. machine tool consumption totaled $243.1 million, down 12.7 percent from June, but up 77.1 percent from $137.2 million reported for July 2003, according to the American Machine Tool Distributors' Association (AMTDA) and the Association For Manufacturing Technology (AMT).

With a year-to-date total of $1.6 billion, 2004 is up 39.3 percent compared to 2003.

"Trends for investment in capital equipment continue thanks to an improving economy and the desire to take advantage of year-end tax incentives and the need to reduce manufacturing costs," said Ralph J. Nappi, AMTDA president. "Seven months into 2004, manufacturing has displayed consistent signs of a rebound capable of worldwide competition."

U.S. machine tool consumption is also reported on a regional basis for five geographic break-downs of the United States.

At $32.8 million, Northeast machine tool consumption in July was down 14.6 percent compared to June's $38.4 million, but up 47.2 percent compared to July a year ago. The year-to-date total of $227.9 million is 52.7 percent higher than the comparable figure for 2003.

Southern machine tool consumption in July totaled $40.1 million, down 19.1 percent from June's $49.6 million, but 56 percent higher than the total for July 2003. With a year-to-date total of $239.2 million, 2004 was 8.8 percent behind 2003 at the same time.

July machine tool consumption in the Midwest totaled $92.2 million, down 21 percent from June's $116.7 million, but 88.8 percent higher than the total for the previous July. At $644.4 million, year-to-date consumption was up 48.5 percent compared to the total at the same time in 2003.

Reaching $52.1 million, July machine tool consumption in the Central region was up 29.6 percent compared to June's $40.2 million and up 93.3 percent compared to July a year ago. The $281.9 million year-to-date total is 53.5 percent above the comparable figure for 2003.

With a total of $26 million, Western machine tool consumption in July was down 22.5 percent compared to June's $33.6 million, but up 92.4 percent compared to last July's total. At $192.1 million, year-to-date 2004 is running 75.2 percent ahead of 2003 at the same time.

The United States Machine Tool Consumption (USMTC) report, jointly compiled by the two trade associations representing the production and distribution of manufacturing technology, provides regional and national U.S. consumption data of domestic and imported machine tools and related equipment.

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Anderson Pump & Process purchases UMISCO
Anderson Pump & Process of Waukesha, Wis., acquired hose manufacturer UMISCO of New Berlin, Wis., which will allow Anderson Pump & Process to aggressively pursue contractor markets while widening its current industrial customer base.

UMISCO operations were moved to the Anderson Pump & Process facility in Waukesha, and began operations Sept. 13. UMISCO's employees moved with the company, joining the 42 employees of Anderson Pump & Process.

A.A. Anderson, the parent company of Anderson Pump & Process, has been providing quality service to its customers since 1958. In addition to its corporate headquarters in Waukesha, Anderson Pump & Process also operates offices in Waupaca, Wis., and Carol Stream, Ill.

UMISCO Inc. was a distributor and manufacturer of made-to-order rubber hose and couplings to a wide variety of industries including automotive, hydraulic, cement, fuel oil and construction. Product lines include Boston, Dixon, Kuriyama, Weatherhead and Parker.

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IT hiring turns soft
The long-awaited recovery in the information technology job market could be off to a shaky start with a slight 2 percent increase in IT employment from the first quarter of 2003 to the first quarter of 2004, according to the Information Technology Association of America (ITAA). The ITAA also reported a shrinking forecast for growth in the remainder of the year.

The telephone survey of 500 hiring managers from IT and non-IT companies nationwide found the overall size of the IT workforce grew from approximately 10.3 million to 10.5 million jobs from early 2003 to early 2004. But demand for IT workers continues to drop, with hiring managers indicating they will seek to fill approximately 270,000 fewer jobs over the entirety of 2004 than they did during 2003.

The ITAA annual survey placed the size of the U.S. IT workforce at 10,526,289 in the first quarter of 2004, with hiring and terminations resulting in 213,639 additional jobs.

Nearly 89 percent of new jobs came from non-IT companies, despite popular fears over mass job loss to outsourcing and globalization. Companies in industries like banking, finance, manufacturing, food service and transportation continue to provide the lion’s share of IT employment, accounting for 79 percent of the IT workforce.

But global sourcing remains a factor in the competitive pressures facing the American IT worker, and care must be taken to prevent America’s competitive position in the global IT market from slipping, according to ITAA president Harris N. Miller.

“This is still not the job market America’s IT workers have been hoping for,” Miller said. “Instead, increased competition appears to be the rule for 2004 here and abroad. The U.S. workforce is not giving up its edge without a fight, but as an industry and as a nation, we must become more competitive if we are to retain our standing as the world’s innovators.”

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Eye and face protection standard available from ISEA
The recently updated American National Standard for Occupational and Education Personal Eye and Face Protection Devices, ANSI Z87.1-2003, is now available from the International Safety Equipment Association (ISEA).

In May 2004, ISEA assumed Secretariat responsibilities for the eye and face protection standard after completion of a transfer from the American Society of Safety Engineers. The Z87 standard gives minimum performance requirements for spectacles, goggles, face shields, welding helmets/hand shields and respirators. It also includes selection, use and maintenance guidance for these devices.

"All eye and face protectors bearing the marking Z87 or represented in any way as being in compliance with this standard have to meet the standard's exacting requirements," said ISEA technical director Janice Comer Bradley. "Moreover, all of their components have to comply with the requirements, as well. The Z87 designation indicates that the product should have been tested and evaluated for performance to all of the applicable requirements of the standard. Purchasers also should ask their safety equipment suppliers for documentation that confirms product testing to the standard."

The 67-page standard features numerous illustrations and includes a pull-out selection chart that can be posted in the workplace to provide guidance for various hazard exposures that require eye and face protection. A reproducible "Eye Injury Report Form" is also included.

An eye and face protection standard has been in existence since shortly after World War I, when the first one, the Z2 standard, was developed from a set of safety standards originally prepared by the War and Navy departments and the National Bureau of Standards. In 1961, the standards Safety Board divided the Z2 project in to three separate standards, and the Z87 standard was born.

The 2003 edition strengthens the standard's impact resistance requirements while still allowing for future technological enhancements in design and materials, according to Bradley. She added that eye and face protection users should keep in mind that spectacles, goggles and face shields are tested to different levels of impact resistance and, therefore, it is incumbent upon the user to select a product tested to the hazard to which he or she is being exposed.

For more information, visit www.safetyequipment.org. 

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Are you ready for some football?
Back by popular demand, Milwaukee Electric Tool is offering its weekly Tools to Victory Quiz. Test your skill at picking the winner of each week's Monday Night Football game. Select which team you think will win that week’s game and answer a quick question about Milwaukee or its products. One winner will be chosen at random from all of that week's correct entrants and will win a Milwaukee tool. Go to the Tools to Victory Quiz icon on our home page at www.milwaukeetool.com to enter.

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Timken, UAW agree to contract
The Timken Co., the United Auto Workers (UAW) and Local 1645 jointly agreed on a new contract. Effective Sept. 12, 2004, through Sept. 8, 2007, the new contract will cover all production and skilled trade employees at the company's facilities in Torrington, Conn.

The agreement was ratified by a large majority of the UAW membership in a meeting Sept. 9.

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