Machine Tool Orders Rise

ByJohn S. McClenahen Lending support to the notion that 2004 will proven to have been a pretty good year for machine tool makers, gross new orders of machine tools for U.S. consumption rose 18.3% in November to $275.2 million, according to a report from the American Machine Tool Distributors' Association and AMT-The Association for Manufacturing Technology. For the first 11 months of 2004, gross new orders for U.S. consumption totaled nearly $2.7 billion, some 43% higher than the $1.87 billion total for the first 11 months of 2003. Full-year 2004 figures should be released in about a month. Last November, new orders of metal cutting machine tools were $254.59 million, 15.6% higher than in October; new orders for metal forming machine tools were $20.61 million, 65.5% higher than in October.