This Thomas Index Report is sponsored by American Crane and Equipment, a leading manufacturer of overhead cranes, hoists, and other material handling equipment.
Hello again. This week we’re going to take a look at sourcing activity for Cranes by users of the Thomasnet.com platform. Our data shows that over the past 12 weeks, sourcing activity for this category is up 14% over its historical average.
Our firmographic buyer data shows that the top three industries driving this trend are Construction, Transportation & Logistics, and Oil & Gas.
While the most well-known and visible types of cranes are the tower cranes seen in the skyline of every growing metropolitan area, a huge range of overhead cranes are used across the full spectrum of industry to do such things as load and unload materials, move materials and equipment within a storage facility or factory floor, and move containers at railyards and shipping ports.
As Industry 4.0 redefines the manufacturing space, efficiency and safety are high priorities. Many facilities are implementing overhead cranes to eliminate obstructions and forklift traffic on the factory floor, to minimize human error, and to gain precise control and placement of heavy loads. The overhead cranes market is significant; accounting for over $4.3 billion in global sales in 2017, according to Allied Market Research.
Overall, cranes range from small workstation jib cranes to massive gantry cranes capable of lifting 20,000 metric tons or more. As the US economy continues to boom – and particularly, as the construction and manufacturing sectors remain strong – we expect sourcing across the entire broad category of Cranes to show continued growth.
In addition to sourcing for Cranes, our data also shows that sourcing activity is up 11% or more in the related categories of Crane Inspection & Certification Services and Crane Mats.
Moving on from Cranes, here’s a look at the top ten industrial product and service categories being sourced on the Thomasnet.com platform over the past four weeks.
- Steel
- Printed Circuit Boards
- Injection Molded Plastic
- CNC Milling
- Metal Stamping
- Metal Fabrication
- CNC Machining
- Corrugated Boxes
- Machining
- Lumber
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Thanks for watching, and I’ll see you next week.