Manufacturing

Research and development is not only the hallmark of Karbochem’s success but also its greatest opportunity for the future, as Gay Sutton discovers from commercial director and chairman Dr Abraham Brink.

UK tobacco group Imperial Tobacco has reported a rise in first-half net profits of 34 per cent on the back of a strong performance in emerging markets.

The company said that net profit for the six months to March 31 was £926 million—up from £689 million the previous year—driven by a particularly strong performance in emerging markets outside of the EU.

Germany’s biggest steelmaker, ThyssenKrupp, has announced a major restructuring of its business as it seeks to increase its focus on engineering.

The €10 billion divestment plan is designed to enable the company to strengthen its existing competences in engineering and take advantage of opportunities in emerging markets to expand its current business scope.

Applied Materials, a leading equipment supplier to the semiconductor industry, has taken the first steps in the $4.9 billion acquisition of Varian Semiconductor Equipment Associates, a leading supplier of ion implantation equipment used by chip makers around the world.

After closure, Varian will operate as a business unit of Applied's Silicon Systems Group and continue to be based in Gloucester, Massachusetts.

New York City has chosen Nissan to supply its next generation taxi fleet. The Taxi of Tomorrow, based on the NV200 minivan, will be built in the Nissan plant in Cuernavaca, Mexico and is expected to enter service in 2013.

The 10-year contract, estimated to be worth $1 billion (£607 million), was announced Tuesday at a City Hall press briefing by Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Nissan Americas Chairman Carlos Tavares.

Caterpillar has reported all time quarterly record profits for Q1 2011, driven by the continuing improvement in global demand for its products and its focus on cost management.

First-quarter revenues of $12.949 billion were up 57 percent from $8.238 billion in the first quarter of 2010. Profit was a record $1.225 billion in the quarter, an increase of 426 percent from $233 million in the first quarter of 2010.

Rajhi Steel Industries turns out more than one million tons of steel products each year; but the round figure keeps cropping up, as commercial vice president Abdul Aziz Al-Hudaib explains.

The Boeing Company has reported first-quarter net income of $0.6 billion ($0.78 per share) on revenue of $14.9 billion and reaffirmed its 2011 revenue, earnings per share and operating cash flow outlook.

"We're off to a good start in an important year for our company," said Jim McNerney, Boeing chairman, president and chief executive officer. "We delivered strong operating performance, made significant progress on 787 and 747-8 flight testing, and scored a major win on the US Air Force Tanker program.

Journalists of a certain age all over the world are feeling a pang or two of nostalgia today, with the news that the last ever manual typewriter has been made in a factory in India.

Godrej and Boyce, the last company to make manual typewriters, has closed its plant in Mumbai, India, leaving the typewriter officially a product of the past.

The car manufacturing industry in the UK is under threat from a lack of local component suppliers, according to Nick Reilly, chairman of GM Europe.

Reilly told the BBC this weekend that the lack of home-based parts manufacturers was the most critical issue facing the UK motor industry, which was obliged to import a high proportion of parts.

Even overseas manufacturers like Toyota and Nissan were finding it hard to compete in their UK operations, he said, because of shipping costs and an extended supply chain.