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In recent months and even years, optimism was a word that was rarely heard in manufacturing. Now, however, small but steady gains are making small and midsized manufacturers approach the future with some hopefulness, a recent survey found.
“We poll our members twice a year, at the beginning and the midpoint of the year, to ask about their expectations about revenues, hiring plans, and capital expenditures,” said Mike McDonald, vice president of member recruitment for Prime Advantage, a buying consortium for midsized-manufacturers, in an interview. “The trend is that it has constantly been getting better in those areas.”
Recently, the company announced the findings of its 12th semi-annual Group Outlook Survey, and the results were promising:
- Ninety-seven percent of respondents reported they expect revenues to be better than or equal to the first half of 2013.
- Forty-two percent anticipate revenue growth will be higher in the second half of 2013 than in the first half 2013.
- The level of capital expenditures is expected to increase at one out of three companies in the second half of 2013.
- Forty-seven percent of companies expect to hire in the next six months and less than percent are planning layoffs.
Of course, manufacturers are not without concerns, pointing to the cost of raw materials as the biggest worry going forward. “There's been a shift in what they are worried about from a cost standpoint,” said McDonald. “Raw materials are always up there on the list because that's where you spend money.” In addition, manufacturers are focusing on manufacturing processes and the cost of baseline materials for components (such as oil and gas) as other areas that bear watching.
Other pressures are created by the current political scene. In fact, 62 percent felt that fiscal policy uncertainties were negatively impacting their business and the overall impact. Most (52 percent) thought that negative impact would continue over the next year. In addition, survey respondents identified the top barriers to business growth over the next 12 months: legislative and regulatory pressures (47 percent); oil and energy pricing (39 percent); and lack of qualified workers (32 percent).
We've asked Mr. McDonald to come and share more about the current manufacturing landscape. We'll be gathering in the EBN Chat Area on October 10 at 1:30 p.m. ET (10:30 a.m. PT). We'll be talking about all the hottest manufacturing topics, from conflict minerals and sourcing concerns to the current talent pool, and how they will impact OEMs. Bring your thoughts and questions and join us there!
The serial-to Ethernet products will solve the hardware connectivity problems.
But in addition to that I think what we need is the application support that will get the raw data from a device over the serial port and reformat it along with the necessary identification tags – such as patient Id, the machine ID, date and time stamp etc so that the further documentation of the medical records becomes easier
More than discussing connectivity issues there is a need for discussing solutions for every healthcare center to implement more and better medical devices as well as a good network, and of course 100 percent reliable WiFi connectivity to allow physicians, and nurses to perform their job without delay.
-Susan
Prabhakar,
At this point electronical medical records should not be the problem it seems to still be in some places. It has been years already, and many hospitals in the US have not successfully adopted EMRs, which is worrying if you come to think about it, as they are falling behind in a sector that can't afford delays.
-Susan
Rich,
Everything is on eBay, isn't it?
-Susan
I believe the issue is not so much getting serial data on to the LAN but what the app does with the data at the other end. It would need to understand the format and data encoding etc. to know what to do with it. That means interoperability between suppliers.
Linking to LAN is really nice idea whereby you can easily have a centralize control and monitoring station for all the patients. How about adopting wireless technology for medical devices? For example, converting to wifi or zigbee ?
I think you are on to something. Having wireless technology would help trememdously.
jbond, that will help a lot such as a lot of wiring can be reduced.
I was thinking more about portability and access to information without being directly in the room. It will make diagnosing and access to medical information more accessible throughout.
jbond, there are some pros and cons as well. The cons is people without authorized access will try to access the information via the wireless system (i.e. they just have to stand near to the access points). Hence security measures have to be put in place.
People without authorization access medical information now via the internet. As long as someone is tech savvy, they will find a way if they want to, unfortunately.
There should be layers that prevent this type of breach. Although most devices need access to network resources internally, not everything needs external access.
So theoretically speaking, only internal users with the know-how should be able to get “unauthorized” access.
>>People without authorization access medical information now via the internet. As long as someone is tech savvy, they will find a way if they want to, unfortunately<<
Any thing commendable or achievable done so far on securing the internet? Either by government or private sector?