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Trade Wars
GE Aerospace Investing $225M to Modernize New York Research Center
GE Aerospace Mon day announced a $225 million investment to modernize the GE Aerospace Research Center in Niskayuna, New York. The State of New York has also committed $8.4 million in tax credits through Empire State Development (ESD) to the project, with Schenectady County Metroplex Development Authority contributing additional local incentives valued at $5.3 million.
The combined investments will modernize the Niskayuna site to strengthen GE Aerospace's research capacity, with approximately two-thirds going toward infrastructure improvements and the remainder dedicated to advanced research equipment and technology. The project is expected to create 75 new full-time jobs over five years, generate short-term construction employment, and safeguard the future of the scientists, engineers, researchers, and skilled laborers who already call Niskayuna home. The new positions will include a mix of research and engineering roles and trade positions. The investment will support execution of advanced technology projects with partners in both academia and the federal sector, particularly Department of Energy and Department of War projects funded through Congressional appropriations.
Read more at Design and Development
Is AI Already Driving Stronger Productivity Growth?
U.S. productivity growth has strengthened notably the past few years, fueling optimism that advances in AI could already be delivering anticipated gains. Since the launch of ChatGPT in late 2022, output per hour has accelerated meaningfully relative to the prior cycle. Yet the evidence linking AI adoption to this pickup remains limited. While industries with higher reported AI usage tend to exhibit stronger productivity performance, these sectors were already leaders, and shifts relative to prior trends do not show a clear AI-driven boost. Instead, a mix of pandemic-era dynamics—including tight labor markets and increased dynamism—appears to explain much of the recent improvement.
Looking ahead, AI remains the ticket to sustaining stronger productivity growth as these pandemic-era tailwinds fade. However, historical experience and measurement challenges suggest caution in judging both the timing and magnitude of its ultimate impact.
Read more at Wells Fargo
Hanwha Defense To Establish $2.2B Manufacturing Campus In Arkansas
Hanwha Defense USA plans to spend $2.2 billion to establish its new advanced manufacturing campus in the U.S. Army Pine Bluff Arsenal installation in Arkansas, the company announced Monday. The project, the company’s first munitions facility in the U.S., will create nearly 400 jobs with an average wage of over $50 an hour, Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders said at the opening ceremony of Hanwha Defense’s new administration headquarters at the Pine Bluff Arsenal on Monday.
The facility will produce propellant charges for 155mm artillery and base bleed units, according to the press release. Construction is expected to be completed by 2030, with operations to begin the following year, Hanwha Defense spokesperson James Hewitt said in an email Tuesday. Hanwha Defense’s new U.S. headquarters will oversee local operations, and the upcoming manufacturing campus will support the “Arsenal of Freedom,” Coulter said. The Arsenal of Freedom is the Department of Defense’s approach to rebuilding the defense industrial base under its New Acquisition Transformation strategy.
Read more at Manufacturing Dive
Boston Dynamics Begins Robotics Testing At Hyundai, Outlines Expansion
Boston Dynamics on Monday officially opened its robotics center at Hyundai’s electric vehicle production site outside of Savannah, Georgia, marking the next step on its journey to deploy humanoids and other robots across the automaker’s operations. The Massachusetts-based company began pilot operations at the Robotics Metaplant Application Center in June and recently transitioned to full operations. The center is located at the Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America and serves as a test bed and training center for integrating Atlas humanoids across Hyundai’s automotive factories.
Boston Dynamics, which became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hyundai in July, is training the robots to take over repetitive parts sequencing and heavy-lifting tasks over the next few years, as well as component assembly by 2030. The company said it plans to begin exploring use cases for Atlas in other industry sectors next year. Hyundai initially plans to deploy 25,000 Atlas units across its global plants, including Kia factories, over the next few years. The automaker also said it will establish a U.S. facility capable of producing 30,000 robots per year. A location was not disclosed.
Read more at Ward’s Auto
Lufthansa Exercises Option for 20 Additional Boeing 737 MAX Aircraft
Lufthansa AG has approved exercising options for 20 Boeing 737 MAX 10 aircraft. These rights were agreed as part of an order for 40 Boeing 737 MAX 8 aircraft in 2023. The 2023 order included 60 purchase options for further aircraft from the Boeing 737 MAX range. The delivery of the newly ordered Boeing 737 MAX 10 aircraft is set to start in the early 2030s. The Company’s Supervisory Board approved the additional acquisition of the aircraft in order to strengthen the company’s long-term capacity planning. The aim is for the new aircraft to replace older Airbus A320 aircraft over time.
The Boeing 737 MAX 10 is the largest aircraft in the Boeing 737 MAX family, with greater seating capacity than the Boeing 737 MAX 8 that is already on order. In addition, the Boeing 737 MAX 10 should consume around 30 percent less fuel than the aircraft it is set to replace. Another cost efficiency is that thanks to the higher seating capacity, unit costs will be cut by around 20 percent. These two factors will help reduce carbon emissions and improve efficiency on European routes.
Read more at Airport Industry
FedEx Levies Fees On US Imports From Canada, Europe And Others
FedEx will levy demand surcharges on various import shipments into the U.S. — including those originating from Canada, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean — starting Monday until further notice, the carrier announced earlier this month. The company will also increase the price of existing demand surcharges on U.S.-bound shipments from various countries in Asia, including China, South Korea and Japan. Fees on U.S. export shipments into Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Latin America and the Caribbean will climb, too.
Affected shippers of FedEx’s latest demand surcharges should update their origin-and-service mappings, model exposure by chargeable weight and confirm country-level changes with FedEx, according to an analysis from ShipScience. Customers importing from China, Hong Kong, Macau or the group featuring Japan, South Korea and others will face the largest immediate cost increases, it added.
Read more at Supply Chain Dive
GM Delivers First PAC-3 Components To Lockheed Martin
GM Defense delivered its first batch of housing components for Lockheed Martin’s Patriot Advanced Capability-3 Missile Segment Enhancement system on Aug. 28, the weapons maker announced Friday. While GM and Lockheed initially announced their collaboration in June, they signed a contract agreement on Aug. 6, according to the press release. GM delivered the components 22 days later. The value of the deal was not disclosed.
Lockheed and GM intend to build on the collaboration by implementing commercial practices across the munitions programs as well as expanding capabilities for other defense systems for the U.S. and its allies. The automaker used its casting and machining capabilities and precision-fabrication expertise to meet the defense specifications, which gives the company the “ability to manufacture with quality at scale,” Stephen duMont, GM Defense’s president and CEO, said in a statement.
Read more at Manufacturing Dive
Hyundai Steel Plans To Open Steel Plant In Louisiana
Hyundai Steel plans to open a hot-rolled and cold-rolled steel manufacturing plant in Donaldsonville, La. The company, which is Hyundai Motor Group's steelmaking arm, will invest $5.8 billion into the project, creating an estimated 5,400 jobs, including 1,300 direct positions. The steel produced at the mill is intended to supply global automakers, including Hyundai Motor and Kia, with high-quality, low-carbon emissions steel.
The new mill will be operated by Hyundai-Posco Louisiana Steel LLC, a joint venture between Hyundai Steel, Posco, Hyundai Motor Company and Kia Corporation. Commercial production is targeted for 2029, with the facility expected to produce 2.7 million metric tons of hot-rolled and cold-rolled steel sheets annually, primarily for automotive applications. The project will use an electric arc furnace-based integrated steelmaking process. The mill also will use a direct reduction process as part of its steelmaking technology. The company says this will be the first electric arc furnace-based integrated steel mill in the U.S. and the first of its kind in North America.
Read more at Plant Services
A Shortage of Oil Tankers Is Leading To Record Shipping Rates Through The Strait Of Hormuz Offsetting Falling Crude Prices
The Iran war has created a new shortage on the oil market. This time the scarce commodity isn’t just crude—it is the ships that carry it. Drone attacks that shut Saudi Arabia’s bypass pipeline earlier this month have forced more crude back through the Strait of Hormuz and onto a tanker fleet already stretched thin. The impact has spread worldwide, as longer voyages and shuttle runs around Hormuz tie up ships and push the daily rate of hiring oil tankers to records. “What matters for refiners is the delivered cost of the crude, and that includes freight,” said Adi Imsirovic, a former energy trader, and lecturer at the University of Oxford. “The price at the pump includes all of it and the consumer has to pay the full price.”
The sudden supply crunch among oil supertankers—known as very large crude carriers, or VLCCs—has boosted the cost of hauling oil through the strait to the highest on record. Earlier this month, the cost of hiring an oil supertanker to load inside the Persian Gulf and transit the Strait of Hormuz topped $1 million a day, according to maritime-intelligence firm Windward. That works out to $26 a barrel, or roughly a quarter of the crude’s value based on the current market price. Normally, shipping costs are a fraction of the value of a crude cargo.
Read more at The WSJ
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