The complete Industry News section from the February 2017 issue of PTE.

Our “Batten Down The Hatches” call proved timely as the market sold off by about (10 percent) before staging a partial recovery

For several months, many economists have been using the “R” word when it comes to manufacturing. They say we’ve been in a global manufacturing recession since some time in the fourth quarter of last year.

Third-quarter earnings confirmed the worst-case scenario — plunging oil prices are whacking almost the entire industrial sector. The theme is hardly new, as the pattern of our headlines has revealed over the past fifteen or so months:

Third-quarter earnings are confirming the worst-case scenario, i.e. — not only are energy related end markets in a downturn, but conditions continue to worsen.

Calendar of upcoming events

I don’t know about you, but the recession of 2008-2010 sticks in my mind like a bad penny. Since that time, I am never able to simply say ...

Spiroid and worm gears have superior advantages for hightorque and miniaturization applications. And for this reason they are particularly preferred in aerospace, robotic and medical applications. They are typically manufactured by hobbing technology, a process with a typical overall lead time of 4 to 14 weeks.

With two armed conflicts underway impacting economic performance in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, we continue our investment stance of “Buy on the Sound of Cannons — Selectively” — but readers of Power Transmission Engineering should not be sanguine. Geopolitics is beginning to exert significant pressure on several end markets: I specifically refer to oil price. West Texas Intermediate or WTI has dropped from its $95-105 trading range in late spring to about $75 — about a (25%) drop despite wo ongoing conflicts because of excess supply.

The best growth market, perhaps in spite of ourselves, is the United States.