Friday Brief Intro 04/02/2022

Good afternoon and welcome to the first Friday Brief of February! With everyone now settled into the new year, 2022 is looking bright!

The MTA is pleased to launch the 2022 edition of the Technology Design and Innovation (TDI) Challenge. The TDI Challenge is the MTA’s flagship school’s competition, providing students with an opportunity to directly engage with our industry. To find and more on how to get involved please go to the story below.

The National Sales Conference is Europe’s leading Personal & Professional Development event for leadership, sales, revenue & customer success professionals. It provides the opportunity to be empowered and inspired by presentations from some of the world’s leading internationally renowned speakers & experts. To book a space and find out who’s involved check out the story.

EAMA, of which MTA is a member, has submitted evidence to International Trade Committee for its inquiry into the EU trading relationship. The submission aims to highlight the most important issues and areas where there is a need for improved government processes. Go to the link in the story to read the full report.

MTA member, 4CM, is running a free half hour webinar to help with your countdown to a successful launch of any new products or services you might have. To register and find out what you can learn please read the story below.

If you are interested in how research into social or economic science can produce actionable insights to help your business adapt to innovative digital technologies, go to our Interact Network story below. InterAct is a new Made Smarter Innovation funded, ESRC-led network that aims to bring together economic and social scientists, UK manufacturers, and digital technology providers to address the human issues caused by the diffusion of new technologies in industry.

The government has published a guide to the benefits of Brexit and Jack Semple (Secretary of EAMA, of which MTA is a member) has written a summary. The full briefing can be found attached to the story below.

The latest readings for the Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) data for the manufacturing sector suggest that some of the supply chain issues may be easing (or at least not getting any worse) although this has a somewhat perverse negative impact on the readings that may or may not be balanced by an increase in output. For example, the UK reading eased while that for the Euro-zone increased and we explore this in an article this week.

The lead element of the Economic News item this week is the news that the Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee raised the UK base interest rate to 0.5%, the 2nd increase in three months with rates going to 0.25% in December. The other elements of this article have a European focus with a report on the European Commission’s Economic Sentiment Index (which includes the latest capacity utilisation figures) and the first release from Eurostat of GDP data for the 4th quarter of 2021.Finally, the January edition of the MTA Business Survey is underway and you can access the questionnaire at www.mta.org.uk/mta-business-survey-jan22. We encourage all MTA members to take a look at the survey and consider if you can spare a couple of minutes to participate – we would love to hear from you.

That’s all we have for this week’s Friday Brief! We look forward to you joining us for more stories next week! Have a great weekend all!

ECONOMIC NEWS

UK Interest Rate Increase and Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Report: The headline here is the decision by the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) to increase interest rates by 25 points to 0.5%. This had been predicted and even the news that this was a close decision with a 5-4 vote was not […]

PURCHASING MANAGERS INDEX FOR MANUFACTURING

January saw the Global Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) for manufacturing produced by J P Morgan using the data from IHS Markit fall back to 53.2; this is the lowest reading for 15 months but it does mean that it has been positive (i.e. above 50) for the past 19 months. Among the headlines at a […]

Benefits of Brexit

The government has published a guide to the benefits of Brexit and Jack Semple (Secretary of EAMA, of which MTA is a member) has written a summary. He notes that the paper draws aggregates much of what the government has done and aspires to do, without any particular reference to what was not possible while […]

InterAct Network

Are you interested in how research into social or economic science can produce actionable insights to help your business adapt to innovative digital technologies? InterAct is a new Made Smarter Innovation funded, ESRC-led network that aims to bring together economic and social scientists, UK manufacturers, and digital technology providers to address the human issues caused by the diffusion […]

Free members webinar: Mission critical marketing for a successful product launch

Launching a new product or service may feel like rocket science but we can help you break it down into bitesize, manageable steps. MTA member, 4CM, is running a free half hour webinar to help with your countdown to a successful launch … To prepare your launch and give you a smooth journey, we’ve put […]

TDI Launch

The Manufacturing Technologies Association (MTA) is pleased to launch the 2022 edition of the Technology Design and Innovation (TDI) Challenge. The TDI Challenge is the MTA’s flagship school’s competition, providing students with an opportunity to directly engage with our industry. To find out more about the competition please look at the following video https://vimeo.com/671990196/42c39a7853 and the flyer below, or […]

National Sales Conference

The National Sales Conference is Europe’s leading Personal & Professional Development event for leadership, sales, revenue & customer success professionals, providing the opportunity to be empowered and inspired by presentations from some of the world’s leading internationally renowned speakers & experts. Date: 10th November 2022 Venue: National Conference Centre, Birmingham Time: 9.30am – 4pm How to book: Visit https://www.nsconference.co.uk and enter […]

EAMA submits evidence on EU trading relationship

EAMA, of which MTA is a member, has submitted evidence to International Trade Committee for its inquiry into the EU trading relationship. The six-page submission seeks to set out an objective overview of member firms’ experiences so far and views for the future, mindful that the impact of Brexit will vary according to circumstances and […]

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