MDM News Digest 3916

August 25, 2009

Wolseley Cuts Ferguson CEO/President Position ... Gates Buys Hydrolink ... Grainger July Sales Down 14% ... Timken India Signs Agreement with Spearage ... GE and FANUC End Joint Venture ... M&A Continues Decline ... Manufacturing Accounts for Most Mass Layoffs ... U.S./Canadian Manufacturer Sales ... Wholesale Prices Down in July ... Earnings: Avnet, BlueLinx Holdings, Kaman, Applied Industrial Technologies, Beacon Roofing Supply, ERIKS, RBC Bearings, General Bearing, Fluor, Illinois Tool Works, The Home Depot ... USMTC Up 22% from May ... Manufacturing Barometer Shows Less Pessimism

In an attempt to improve operational efficiencies throughout the company, UK-based Wolseley announced it would eliminate the position of president and CEO for U.S. subsidiary Ferguson, according to a report published in the Daily Press of Newport News, VA. Frank Roach, current CEO of Wolseley North America, will assume the additional responsibilities as CEO of Ferguson from John Stegeman effective August 31. The move was made to eliminate duplicate responsibilities in the North America division, which includes Ferguson and Wolseley Canada. More

Gates Corp., Denver, CO, has acquired the Dubai-based Hydrolink Group of Companies, a fluid engineering company focused on the oil and gas markets in the Middle East and CIS regions. Hydrolink currently operates 20 locations. More

Grainger, Chicago, IL, reported daily sales results for the month of July 2009 declined 14% versus July 2008, primarily the result of weak demand across all customer end-markets and geographies. Foreign exchange negatively affected sales by approximately one percentage point. U.S. sales were down 14%; Canadian sales were down 19% (down 10% in local currency). Sales from Other Businesses were up 5%. More

Timken India Ltd., Bangalore, India, a segment of The Timken Company, Canton, OH, has signed a marketing agreement with India’s Spareage Seals Limited, allowing Timken to offer Spareage’s complete range of oil seals to customers and distributors throughout India. More

GE and Japanese manufacturer FANUC have agreed to dissolve the GE Fanuc Automation Corporation joint venture. The agreement allows each company to refocus its investments on existing businesses and core industry expertise. Under the terms of the agreement, GE retains the software, services, embedded systems and control systems businesses, which will be known as GE Intelligent Platforms. FANUC will retain the global CNC business. More

The pace of mergers and acquisitions continued to decline across the industrial products sectors during the first half of 2009 compared to the first half of 2008, according to a series of quarterly M&A reports released by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. Total deal value in industrial manufacturing was $4 billion, down 85% from first-half 2008. Average deal value decreased by 48%. Deal volume in the transportation & logistics sector was down 45% in the second quarter of 2009, and overall deal value dropped 55%. More

Mass layoff events reached a record high during the second quarter of 2009 with the manufacturing sector accounting for 31% of the separations, according to preliminary figures released by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. Employers initiated 2,994 mass layoff events in the second quarter of 2009 resulting in the separation of 534,881 workers from their jobs for at least 31 days. More

U.S. manufacturers’ sales fell by 2.8% in June 2009 when compared to May 2009, according to sales data released by the Power Transmission Distributors Association. Sales in June 2009 fell 32.9% compared to the same period last year. Orders in June 2009 decreased by 5.3% over May 2009 orders. Canadian manufacturers’ sales increased 7.6% compared to May 2009. Sales were down 25.5% when compared to the same period last year. Confidence in the Canadian market rose 0.1% to 4.4, while U.S. confidence held at a current negative position of 4.8 for the third consecutive month. More

Wholesale prices declined 0.9% in July, seasonally adjusted, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported. This decrease followed advances of 1.8% in June and 0.2% in May. At the earlier stages of processing, prices received by manufacturers of intermediate goods moved down 0.2% in July after rising 1.9% in the prior month, and the crude goods index fell 4.5% following a 4.6-percent increase in June. More

Avnet, Inc., Tempe, AZ, reported sales of $16.2 billion for fiscal year 2009, down 9.6% over fiscal year 2008. The electronics distributor recorded a loss of $1.12 billion for the fiscal year, compared to profit of $499.1 million a year ago. Organic sales were down 15.6%. For the fourth quarter, sales were $3.77 billion, down 19.5% over fourth quarter fiscal year 2008. Net loss was $30.9 million, compared to profit of $144.1 million for the prior year period. More

BlueLinx Holdings Inc., Atlanta, GA, a distributor of building products in North America, reported sales for the second quarter ended July 4, 2009, of $424 million, down 49% from the same period a year ago. Profit declined 91% to $0.6 million. For the six months ended July 4, 2009, net loss totaled $60.0 million on sales of $831 million, compared with a net loss of $4.0 million on revenues of $1.55 billion a year ago. More

Bloomfield, CT-based Kaman Corp. reported sales for the second quarter were $293.2 million, down 7.3% from second quarter 2008. Profit increased 31.9% to $9.4 million. Sales for the first half of 2009 were $587.3 million, down 2.5% from the first half of last year. Profit decreased 1.3% to $14.8 million. Industrial Distribution second quarter segment sales were $156.0, a decrease of 23.3% from the prior year. More

Industrial distributor Applied Industrial Technologies, Cleveland, OH, reported fiscal 2009 sales decreased 8% to $1.9 billion from the previous year. Profit decreased to $42.3 million, down from $95.5 million in 2008. Sales for the fourth quarter fell 19.7% to $425.2 million. Applied recorded a net loss for the period of $8 million, compared with profit of $24.4 million in the prior-year period. More

Peabody, MA-based Beacon Roofing Supply Inc. reported sales for the third quarter 2009 fell 9.9% to $463.6 million from the prior-year period. Profit for the third quarter was $17.2 million, down slightly from the prior-year period. Sales increased 2.4% to $1.2 billion in the first nine months of 2009 from $1.2 billion in last year's first nine months. Profit for the first nine months was $33.4 million, up from $15.4 mill ion 2008. More

Dutch distributor ERIKS reported sales for the first half of 2009 of €518.1 million (US$737.5 million), down 0.1% from the same period last year. Profit declined 53% to €13.2 million (US$18.8 million). Headcount was reduced by more than 450. On August 6, ERIKS was acquired by Dutch holding company SHV. As a result, ERIKS will be delisted. More

RBC Bearings Inc., Oxford, CT, reported sales for the first quarter of fiscal year 2010 were $63.7 million, down 31% from the prior year period, led by a drop of 46.3% in industrial sales. Profit declined 52.6% to $5.1 million. More

General Bearing Corp., West Nyack, NY, reported second-quarter sales of $41.3 million, a decrease of 40.3% from the prior year same period. Profit was $92,000, compared to $2.7 million a year ago. For the six months ended July 4, 2009, sales were $21.5 million, down 38.7% from the first half of 2008. The manufacturer of bearings and bearing components recorded a loss of $180,000 for the term, compared to profit of $1.5 million the prior year. More

Fluor Corp., Irving, TX, reported second quarter sales of $5.3 billion, down 8% from second quarter 2008. Profit declined 19% to $169 million. For the first six months, sales were $11.1 billion, up 5% from the first half of 2008. Profit increased 8.5% to $374 million. Fluor’s Industrial & Infrastructure segment reported sales of $998 million, up 9% from the prior year. More

Illinois Tool Works Inc., Glenview, IL, reported operating revenue decrease of 24% for the three months ended July 31, 2009. The revenue decline for the three months consisted of a 21% decrease in base revenues and an 8% decline in contributions from currency translation. Acquisitions contributed 5% to revenues in the three month period. More

Home improvement retailer The Home Depot, Atlanta, GA, reported sales for the second quarter ended August 3, 2009, were $19.1 billion, down 9.1% from the prior year period. Profit declined 7% to $1.12 billion. Comparable store sales for the second quarter were negative 8.5% overall and down 6.9% for U.S. stores. Fiscal year-to-date, sales were $35.2 billion, down 9.4% from the first half of fiscal year 2008. Profit improved 4.6% to $1.6 billion. More

June U.S. manufacturing technology consumption totaled $135.85 million, according to the Association For Manufacturing Technology and the American Machine Tool Distributors’ Association. This total was up 22 percent from May but down 69.2 percent from the total of $440.55 million reported for June 2008. With a year-to-date total of $759.03 million, 2009 is down 70.1 percent compared with 2008. More

The second quarter PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP Manufacturing Barometer reports less pessimism among U.S.-based industrial manufacturers over the U.S. and global economies. While a majority of survey respondents continued to view the U.S. and global economies as declining in the second quarter of 2009, their overall outlook through the second quarter of 2010 shows improvement. More

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