GE Reports » American Renewal

Keep On Trucking: GE Survey Shows Transportation CFOs Largely Upbeat

GEreporter — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 16:41:58 +0000

Seventy percent of all goods shipped in the United States are moved by truck. As a result, the health of the trucking industry, with annual revenues of $650 billion, or 4.4% of the U.S. GDP, is one of the leading domestic economic indicators. GE Capital has been helping finance the industry for the past 35 years. Because of its relationships with manufacturers, dealers, and trucking companies, it stands in a good place to judge the health of this crucial industry.

This fall, GE Capital released its U.S. Mid-Market CFO Survey, which polled chief financial officers across seven different industries, including trucking companies.

The data are encouraging, despite concerns about costs and regulations. Transportation CFOs are less optimistic about the U.S. economy and the global economy, but they’re relatively upbeat when it comes to the state of their own industry. They expect both revenues and profit margins to rise. At the same time, they expect their costs to increase as well, with energy expenditures their number one concern.

See our graphic below for more from the survey.

In Economist Intelligence Unit Survey, U.S. Business Leaders Believe Green Tech, Innovation Will Drive Future U.S. Manufacturing Growth

GEreporter — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 08:59:34 +0000

Ninety percent of American business leaders agree that green technologies and the energy industry will power manufacturing growth in the U.S. over the next three years, along with high-tech and biotechnology, according to a survey of 360 senior industry executives about the future of manufacturing sponsored by GE and carried out by the Economist Intelligence Unit.

The same large majority also believes that innovation will be the future driver of manufacturing growth in America with 63% of respondents stressing that innovation in manufacturing processes was extremely important to the long-term success of the U.S. as a manufacturing destination.

The three greatest assets providing the U.S. manufacturing industry with an edge over emerging markets, according to the surveyed executives, are innovative processes, intellectual property protection and the high quality of products.

The polled group also agreed that business-led initiatives are the key to the future competitiveness of the industry, rather than government incentives to bolster innovation. The executives do see a role for the government in improving science and math education, offering tax incentives, and creating a better regulatory environment.

Our graphic below illustrates more from the survey.

The survey was carried out in August 2011. Some 40% of the 360 respondents were board members or C-level executives, including 96 CEOs, from industries such as high-tech, electronics, energy, biotech, pharmaceuticals, and other. More than half run companies with annual revenues above $500 million and one third with revenues over $10 billion.

In conjunction with the survey, Visualizing.org, a data visualization initiative jointly created by GE and Seed Media Group, has announced a public challenge to interpret the EIU data and other government manufacturing statistics. The goal is to visualize the information in a compelling way that illustrates the dynamics of U.S. manufacturing. The winner will receive a $2,000 prize. An honorable mention recipient will receive a $500 courtesy prize. The prizes will be funded by GE. The submission deadline is November 8, 2011.

Meet Seth and Mallika: Faces of American Manufacturing

GEreporter — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 14:38:20 +0000

In the last 18 months, GE has announced the creation of over 8,000 new jobs in the U.S., swelling the ranks of an American workforce of 133,000 employees. Fuelling that steady growth is global demand for the kind of advanced technology that GE has been inventing and making for nearly 130 years.

Behind the big numbers are creative, highly skilled American workers. Meet two of them, Seth and Mallika. A military vet, Seth Stump makes jet engines in Durham, North Carolina (he also owns a tattoo shop). Mallika Ramaswamy makes rotors for gas turbines in Greenville, South Carolina (she started as an intern). They and thousands of their American colleagues are at work everyday, putting together the sophisticated machines the world needs, one at a time.

Slideshow: New Instagrams of GE’s Advanced Manufacturing Ops in the U.S.

GEreporter — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 17:36:37 +0000

GE’s advanced manufacturing operations in the U.S. have thrown open their doors for a summer-long open house these last few months, beginning with Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt’s Manufacturing Tour in July. GE Reports has spoken to three highly-skilled employees with nearly a century of advanced manufacturing experience between them in Houston; looked at innovative manufacturing techniques and processes developed by workers on the factory floor; and provided a myriad of coverage of recent and ongoing manufacturing jobs announcements here in America.

But without further ado, here is another installment of GE’s Instagram gallery of some of the big machines, tools and industrial products made at facilities across the U.S. Check it out!

Technicians Lee Rertel and Darrell Miller at work on an LM6000 gas turbine, whose technology is derived from our CF6 aircraft engine.

New GE Aviation Facility to Open in Mississippi, 250 New Jobs Continue GE’s U.S. Manufacturing Momentum

GEreporter — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 19:26:51 +0000

GE’s manufacturing operations in the U.S. have been on a roll lately, with advanced, R&D-driven techniques and processes, ground-up factory floor innovation and growing demand for exports fueling expansion in, most recently, New York, Texas and Pennsylvania. In the last eighteen months, GE has announced the creation of approximately 7,000 new high-tech manufacturing jobs. That total will increase with the announcement today in Mississippi that GE Aviation will invest $56 million to build a new 300,000 square foot facility in Ellisville that will create 250 new jobs within the next five years. The plant is expected to open in 2013. Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour joined GE Aviation President and CEO David Joyce at the announcement.

The new facility will join an existing Mississippi aviation factory—opened in Batesville in 2008—in manufacturing advanced composite components for aircraft engines and systems. The Ellisville plant’s 250 new high-tech manufacturing jobs come on top of Batesville’s growing roster of 300 employees. GE Aviation expects to invest $150 million in the two locations by the end of the decade. The company has more than 30 locations across the U.S and announced with its joint venture companies new engine and service orders totaling $27 billion at the recent Paris Air Show.

Check out the video below to see workers in Batesville, MS, assembling carbon fiber composite fan blades for the GEnx engine, which powers the new Boeing 787 Dreamliner and 747-8.

“GE Aviation’s decision to expand its presence in Mississippi and build a new facility in Ellisville speaks volumes about the company’s ongoing confidence in Mississippi’s business climate, in our research capabilities and in our skilled workforce,” said Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour. “We are excited to expand our production capability in Mississippi with the opening of a second plant that will create hundreds of new high-tech jobs this decade for the state,” said Joyce.

Breakthroughs in composite material technology at GE Global Research—sparked in part by more than $12 billion spent in research and development over the last decade—have allowed GE’s engineers to design and build aircraft engines and systems that provide greater durability and engine weight savings. Aircraft flying with the engines are more efficient and cost less to operate, maintain and replace.

GE to Open Second Aviation Manufacturing Plant in Mississippi

GEreporter — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 07:59:48 +0000

Press Release: July 27, 2011 04:00 PM Eastern Daylight Time

Will create 250 new high-tech manufacturing jobs

$56 million state-of-the-art manufacturing facility to open in 2013

More than 600 jobs created and $150 million invested in two Mississippi plants

ELLISVILLE, Miss.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–GE Aviation, a global leader in jet engine and aircraft systems production, announced today it will open a new manufacturing facility in Ellisville, Miss., to meet accelerating global demand. GE will invest $56 million in the new facility. The company is targeting for production to begin in 2013 and will create 250 new high-tech manufacturing jobs by 2016.

The 300,000-square foot facility will manufacture advanced composite components for aircraft engines and systems for GE Aviation’s growing business. The announcement follows the 2008 opening of GE Aviation’s manufacturing facility in Batesville, Mississippi, which now employs 300 workers – and is growing. The two sites represent a $150 million investment by GE in aviation technology by the end of decade.

“We are excited to expand our production capability in Mississippi with the opening of a second plant that will create hundreds of new high-tech jobs this decade for the state,” said David Joyce, President and CEO, GE Aviation. “GE has invested more than $12 billion in the research and development of reliable technology innovation over the past ten years and today’s announcement shows that commitment is paying off.”

“Within ten years, GE Aviation will have created more than 600 jobs for Mississippi workers and invested $150 million in the state,” said Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour.

The expansion into Mississippi underscores the growth at GE Aviation, where deliveries of commercial engines for GE and its partner companies will grow this year and in 2012, approaching record levels. Over the next several years, GE Aviation will invest hundreds of millions of dollars across its more than 30 operations in the U.S., including at new manufacturing operations in Auburn, Alabama; and in Mississippi. GE Aviation employs approximately 17,000 workers in manufacturing in the U.S.

In 2011, deliveries of commercial engines produced by GE Aviation, CFM International (50/50 joint company of GE and Snecma), and the Engine Alliance (50/50 joint company of GE and Pratt & Whitney) will grow approximately 10 percent over 2010 deliveries of 2000 engines.

Combined with GE’s military engines, total engine deliveries in 2011 for GE Aviation and its partner companies are expected to reach 3,200 engines.

During the Paris Air Show in June, GE Aviation and its joint venture companies accumulated engine and services orders valued at more than $27 billion. GE engines are now on more than 25,000 planes around the world.

GE develops and produces the world’s most advanced composite components for jet engines and systems. Composite components being produced by GE Aviation in Mississippi provide greater durability and engine weight savings, which translate into better aircraft fuel efficiency and reduced maintenance and replacement costs.

GE Aviation introduced composite fan blades to jet travel in 1995 with its GE90 engine on the Boeing 777. Since then, composite components have continued to be incorporated into both GE commercial and military engines, as well as into aircraft systems.

Members of Mississippi Delegation reacts to GE Aviation announcement:

*Senator Thad Cochran: “GE Aviation will find South Mississippi to be a good home. I am grateful for the efforts made by Governor Barbour, the Mississippi Development Authority and others who made this excellent news possible.”

*Senator Roger Wicker: “I applaud GE Aviation’s commitment to locate and invest in Mississippi.”

*Congressman Gregg Harper: “During this time of economic uncertainty, Mississippians welcome with open arms the 250 GE jobs this venture will create.”

*Congressman Steven Palazzo: “The location of the new GE Aviation facility in Ellisville will be a welcome addition to the aviation and manufacturing industry in Mississippi.”

GE Aviation, an operating unit of GE (NYSE: GE), is a world-leading provider of jet and turboprop engines, components and integrated systems for commercial, military, business and general aviation aircraft. GE Aviation has a global service network to support these offerings. For more information, visit us at www.ge.com/aviation. Follow GE Aviation on Twitter at http://twitter.com/GEAviation and YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/user/GEAviation.

About GE

GE (NYSE: GE) is a diversified infrastructure and finance company taking on the world’s toughest challenges. From aviation and power generation to financial services, healthcare solutions, oil and gas and rail, GE operates in more than 100 countries and employs about 300,000 people worldwide. For more information, visit the company’s website at www.ge.com.

Contacts

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Rick Kennedy, 513-243-3372
rick.l.kennedy@ge.com
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Deb Case, 513-243-0094
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Slideshow: GE’s Advanced Manufacturing Operations in the U.S., Instagrammed

GEreporter — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 16:47:01 +0000

GE’s Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt recently visited three hubs of GE’s advanced manufacturing operations in the U.S. – the GE Global Research Center in Niskayuna, NY; the GE Aviation Manufacturing Facility in Durham, NC; and the GE Energy Manufacturing Facility in Greenville, SC. The labs and factories are just part of GE’s larger manufacturing presence in the U.S.

Check out our Instagram slideshow to get up close and personal with some rather large pieces of machinery and go deep inside labs where innovation is born – in Cincinnati, OH, and Schenectady, NY, where Thomas Edison’s Edison General Electric became GE in 1892.

Get the flash player here: http://www.adobe.com/flashplayer

GE’s Advanced Manufacturing Operations in the U.S. By the Numbers

GEreporter — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 18:23:49 +0000

Last week GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt visited three large GE manufacturing labs and facilities in the U.S.: the GE Global Research Center in Niskayuna, NY; the GE Aviation Manufacturing Facility in Durham, NC; and the GE Energy Manufacturing Facility in Greenville, SC. All three locations — along with their dozens of American counterparts — exemplify an industrial renaissance that is happening in the U.S., driven by advanced manufacturing techniques and ground-up innovation and supporting thousands of new jobs and making products for export. Check out some of the facts and figures behind GE’s operations in the U.S. and the three sites Jeff visited in our infographic below:

Click to enlarge

GE Perspective: U.S. Free Trade Agreements with Korea, Panama and Colombia Are Vital for Export Growth

GEreporter — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 17:31:02 +0000

One unquestionable bright spot in the U.S. Economy these days are exports. With many trading partners growing two, three or even four times faster than the US economy, American exports have been growing steadily and today support millions of jobs here at home. As the second-largest manufacturing exporter in the US, GE and its American workers have a significant stake in the continued growth of trade and exports.

Ed Gerwin, Senior Fellow for Trade and Global Economic Policy at Third Way says, “A famous bank robber once said that he robbed banks because that’s where the money is. Well the United States needs to export because that’s where the economic growth is.”

In Washington, trade is about to get put to the test. Free trade agreements (FTAs) with three close allies — Korea, Colombia, and Panama — are ready to be submitted to Congress, and many thousands of GE workers stand to benefit from their timely approval.

The FTAs will eliminate tariffs in these markets that can impose costs of 10 percent or more on goods exported from the United States. They also eliminate regulatory, licensing and other government-imposed barriers, enabling U.S. companies like GE to compete and win abroad. Korea, Colombia and Panama are growing markets – supporting close to $2 billion in GE revenues last year. With FTAs in place there, we can anticipate GE sales to grow even faster – as they have with our other FTA partners – and support more U.S. jobs.

Jay Timmons, President and CEO of the National Association of Manufacturers, says prompt action on these agreements is crucial because the markets of Korea, Colombia and Central America are expanding. “There is growth and opportunity in those markets, and if the United States is not poised to take advantage of that opportunity, we’re not going to be able to compete in those markets effectively, when other countries around the world will be able to do so.”

Ever since 1880, when Thomas Edison built that first lighting factory in Menlo Park, GE has been manufacturing in America. And for more than 100 years, it has been selling those goods abroad, supporting jobs in the United States while helping to raise standards of living globally. Last year, GE had more than $17 billion worth of exports – double the number of just five years ago. Today, those international markets matter more than ever. Whether its sales of gas turbines to Saudi Arabia, health care devices to Mexico, or aircraft engines to China, exports to the world are helping to power GE, today and into the future.

As GE Chairman & CEO Jeff Immelt said earlier this week at the US Chamber of Commerce: “We should get these [FTAs] approved and get moving on other trade deals and we should do this today.”

A Conversation with American Manufacturing Workers

GEreporter — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 19:06:12 +0000

As part of this week’s focus on American manufacturing, GE Reports recently spoke to three long-time manufacturing employees at the GE facility in Houston, Texas, where some of the full suite of Blow-Out Preventers (BOPs) made by GE are assembled. The current plant was opened by the Hydril Corporation in the early 1980s and was purchased by GE in April 2008. Both on- and off-shore BOPs are manufactured at the plant, and they aren’t small objects: each offshore stack has roughly 70,000 component parts, boasts a price tag ranging from $30 to $60 million and can take anywhere from one to two years to fully assemble.

A highly-skilled workforce oversees this complicated process, and we spoke to three of the plant’s most seasoned workers: George Krummel, the Manufacturing and Shop Operations Manager, Tommy Kowis, an Assembly Specialist, and Larry Jones, a Machinist. Together the three have nearly a century of experience putting these enormous, complex machines together. (The Q&A has been edited for length and clarity).

100 Years of Know-How: George Krummel, Tommy Kowis, and Larry Jones.

GE Reports: Could you each explain your background working at the plant?

George: I started about 34 years ago, in September 1977 as a machiner, and I helped move equipment into this facility, so I’ve been here since before it opened. It’s been a great experience, learning from the different people I’ve worked in a lot of different roles: supervision or management, manufacturing and production production control, manufacturing engineering. Currently I’m at the main plant, which involves seaming, welding and assembly – helping oversee the operations of the whole plant.

Tommy: I started in 1978, and I didn’t have any experience in a machine shop, so I started on the floor, then I started a day shift in assembly and have been doing that for about 30 years.

Larry: I was 19 when I started, 33 years ago, first as a forklift operator. Then I went into CNC machines, which I’ve been working with ever since.

George: I just want to clarify, I was only 12 when I started. (Laughs)

GE Reports: Over the three decades you’ve been at the plant, what are some of the changes you’ve experienced?

George: In machining, you used to have a lot of workers with that skill set. After the economy went down in the 1980s, a lot of those people found other jobs in computers, for example. So we lost some machinists from that era who were true journeyman machinists. And, the old manual machines were replaced by new equipment, like the CNC machine.

GE Reports: How do all of the changes in technology affect training? How much time do you spend updating your skills?

George: So much of the training has been brought in-house, in the manufacturing area – it’s learning on the job. You look for people who maybe have a machine or controls background and bring them in to teach them the product and your process and tooling – that’s the same in our well department and in assembly.

Tommy: There is also an information exchange between the assembly group and the engineering group, where we try to improve the process by comparing information. If there’s a problem, we share it with the engineers, they work on it and get back to us with a possible fix. But they come to us, because as George said, fixes and improvements and training have to happen here where we’re working on the floor.

GE Reports: What’s the customer involvement in that process of information sharing? These are highly custom-made products, so the specs are going to vary based on customer needs – are the customers observing on the factory floor?

Tommy: I have two customers right now in assembly. We might go two or three days without a customer, but yesterday we had three there.

GE Reports: When customers observe testing of the BOPs, how long does that take from start to finish?

Tommy: Anywhere from an hour or two to maybe a week or so.

The factory floor in Houston.

GE Reports: I have to say, if you came to observe me editing GE Reports all day, it would stress me out – is there a lot of pressure with customers around watching you work and test?

Tommy: Yes, sometimes, especially when there are problems or there’s a cut-off date coming up. Sometimes the customer has a plane waiting to be loaded with your finished product. But we get it done.

GE Reports: Larry, tell us about the level of customization for the machines – are you constantly retooling or do you have to devise processes for each individual piece you work on?

Larry: Yes, we’re retooling all the time. New products and parts are coming in all the time – so I’m constantly adjusting to them, printing out new programs for them.

GE Reports: Seems like this is constantly a work in progress – and you guys have the freedom to develop new ways of doing things, whether it’s finding a new process that is more efficient, and it’s open to tinkering and ground-up innovation – would you agree?

George: That’s right. Ever since I’ve been here, we’ve always been empowered to come up with changes and new ideas. We have awards for that. We also have “Quality Fridays,” where the employees can share ideas with the director of manufacturing. Sometimes these are quick fixes but also big ones. At this plant, the employees are the experts.

GE Reports: A stack of offshore BOPs has something like 70,000 component parts, and you guys have been here for thirty some odd years each. Could you rattle off every single piece for me? Does it become second nature?

George: Yes it does. Tommy can describe every part and how it functions, having been in assembly for 30 years. So we have a lot of engineers visiting Tommy on the floor, to help them solve problems

GE Reports: Tommy, how do you keep it all straight?

Tommy: (laughs) I’ve been doing it for a long time. I worked with the original engineers, the old-timers, who designed some of the BOPs from scratch. I have to explain to customers how all the parts work. I’ve been doing this for 30 years, and I still enjoy it. I feel alert and confident, and I’m still learning everyday.