Manufacturing

December 14, 2016

Green cars line-up on the starting grid

In 1899 the Belgian, Camille Jenatzy, broke the speed barrier at 100 kilometres an hour in a cigar shaped electric car known as La Jamais Contente. In 1900 at the World Exhibition…

December 14, 2016

High-minded hopes for automation

Motorists and pedestrians will breathe a sigh of relief at the prospect of a cloud-to-car future of autonomous and emission-free driving. Or will they? Technology groups such as Apple and Microsoft are…

November 30, 2016

Driving skills at Daimler and Porsche

Luxury carmaker Daimler is helping refugees and migrants in Germany boost their skills and find work with an innovative programme that will, by the end of the year, have seen almost 600…

November 16, 2016

Japan steps gently into a post-Brexit world

The ascension of President-elect Donald Trump onto the world’s stage last Wednesday dominated the global news. At 4:05pm on the same day, less noticed, the Japanese Ambassador to the United Kingdom, Koji…

November 16, 2016

Young take centre stage in engineering’s future

Engineering companies will have more than 1.5 million vacancies to fill over the next six years and the UK needs now to work on providing the skills that would help fill them….

November 9, 2016

Industry, politics and automobiles

The UK Government’s announcement that Nissan will build two new vehicle models at its Sunderland plant, saving thousands of jobs, combined two persistent themes of political engagement with the automotive industry in…

October 12, 2016

Carmakers on a road less travelled

The number 66 has iconic status in automotive circles, evoking the spirit of freedom and expansion along America’s most famous highway. While Route 66 shot long and straight across the US, Britain’s…

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US claim China poses threat to Panama Canal triggers angry Beijing response
US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Tuesday the Panama Canal faces ongoing threats from China but that together the United States and Panama will keep it secure. Hegseth's remarks triggered a fiery response from the Chinese government, which said: “Who represents the real threat to the Canal? People will make their own judgement.” Speaking at a ribbon cutting for a new US-financed dock at the Vasco Nuñez de Balboa Naval Base after a meeting with Panama President José Raúl Mulino, Hegseth said the US will not allow China or any other country to threaten the canal's operation. "To this end, the United States and Panama have done more in recent weeks to strengthen our defense and security cooperation than we have in decades," he said. Hegseth alluded to ports at either end of the canal that are controlled by a Hong Kong consortium, which is in the process of selling its controlling stake to another consortium including BlackRock Inc. France 24, April 9

Trump presses ahead with a trade war
President Trump’s tariffs took effect earlier this morning, hitting nearly all US allies with punishing new levies and raising import taxes on Chinese goods to more than 100 per cent. Trump said 70 governments have already approached the US to make deals, and that officials would begin talks with Japan and South Korea. China has already responded with its own levies, and the EU is preparing its own retaliatory tariffs on American products starting next week. These plans, and others like them, have heightened fears of an economically damaging trade war and a global recession, as losses mount in stock markets around the world. New York Times, April 9

US consumers face sharp price increases from Donald Trump’s tariffs, say analysts
Prices of leather goods, clothing, furniture and consumer electronics are expected to increase sharply for US households in the coming months because the country relies heavily on imports from nations targeted by Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs, according to analysts. Economists at the Richmond Federal Reserve forecast the US president’s so-called reciprocal tariffs, which are due to take effect on Wednesday, will have a “disproportionate impact” on various industries that import manufactured goods from Asia, including leather and apparel. Goods imported to the US from China face tariffs of more than 104 per cent after the White House on Tuesday said Trump was pushing ahead with a further escalation of his trade conflict with Beijing. Trump hit Vietnam, the second-largest apparel exporter to the US after China and a major supplier of leather goods such as handbags, with a 46 per cent tariff last week - one of the highest levies announced on his self-declared “liberation day”. Cambodia, which supplies clothing brands including Lululemon and Hugo Boss, has been set a tariff of 49 per cent. Financial Times, April 9

European air traffic warning means summer delays for holidaymakers
Holidaymakers should expect flight delays this summer, European air traffic control bosses have warned. Eurocontrol, which manages European airspace, said that disruption could be even greater than last year when passengers experienced the worst delays since 2001. The body is expecting to handle 5 per cent more flights than last summer. Delays in summer 2024 were 47 per cent worse than in 2023, with capacity and staffing issues the greatest factor. Steven Moore, Eurocontrol’s head of air traffic management operations, said that the situation was made worse because Europe is “a highly saturated network where any issue becomes a network problem”. He said that the expected increase in traffic this summer posed “a significant challenge in a constrained network”, adding: “It’s plain we won’t have a summer without delays.” The Times, April 9

Government considers nationalising British Steel
The government is considering nationalising British Steel as fears grow among ministers that the company's blast furnaces in Scunthorpe could run out of raw materials within days. Chancellor Rachel Reeves has sought to reassure workers at the Lincolnshire plant that the government would consider nationalisation if necessary. Reeves spoke to trade unions over the weekend to explain the government's outlook on the steelworks' future. It is understood she told them she was acutely aware of the steel industry's strategic importance to the UK. US President Donald Trump has levied a 25 per cent tariff on American imports of steel. British Steel has said its two blast furnaces in Scunthorpe are "no longer financially sustainable" and there are fears that without government support 2,700 jobs could be lost. The firm has been owned by the Chinese company Jingye since 2020. Jingye says it has invested more than £1.2bn into British Steel to maintain operations and claims it suffered financial losses of around £700,000 a day. BBC news, April 9

British space company to design fleet of satellites that may help map early universe
A British space company is designing a fleet of satellites that could orbit the moon and map the early universe. The Italian Space Agency has commissioned Blue Skies Space to design the satellites that could detect faint radio signals from the dawn of the universe. These signals are almost impossible to detect from Earth’s surface due to human-made radio interference, but the far side of the moon is shielded from this noise. Dr Marcell Tessenyi, the chief executive of Blue Skies Space, said: “We want to be able to peek into those dark ages and get knowledge of large-scale structures of the early universe. Doing this from the Earth’s surface is very difficult.” The Italian Space Agency has commissioned the €200,000 design project to uncover whether a fleet of four or more satellites could detect these radio signals, which sit in the FM radio range. The signatures, dating to less than a million years after the big bang, could give insights into a time before the first stars formed when the universe was mostly hydrogen gas. The Guardian, April 9

US and Iran will hold nuclear talks, Trump says
President Trump said that the US would engage in “direct” negotiations with Iran on Saturday in a last-ditch effort to rein in the country’s nuclear program. If they take place, they will be the first official face-to-face negotiations between the two countries since Trump abandoned the Obama-era nuclear accord seven years ago. Iranian officials confirmed that talks would take place on Saturday in Oman, but that they would be indirect, meaning intermediaries would work with the two sides. If the talks went well, they said, Iran would be open to direct negotiations. Trump said that Iran would be “in great danger” if the talks were not successful. But Iran is almost certain to resist dismantling its entire nuclear infrastructure, which has given it a “threshold” capability to make the fuel for a bomb in a matter of weeks - and perhaps a full weapon in months. New York Times, April 8

Zelensky confirms Ukraine troops in Russia's Belgorod region
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has publicly acknowledged for the first time that his troops are active in Russia's Belgorod region, which borders Ukraine. "We continue to carry out active operations in the border areas on enemy territory, and that is absolutely just - war must return to where it came from," he said on Monday. His comments also referred to Russia's Kursk region, where Ukraine still holds a small area after a major offensive last year. Moscow has since retaken most of the territory. Zelensky said "the main objective" was to protect Ukraine's Sumy and Kharkiv border regions, and to "ease the pressure" on other parts of the vast front line, particularly in the eastern Donetsk region. Russia's military had last month reported Ukrainian attempts to cross over into the Belgorod region - but said such attacks had been rebuffed. The areas in question are only a short distance inside Russian territory. Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and Moscow currently controls about 20 per cent of Ukraine's territory. The Kremlin has rejected US and European allegations that it is dragging its feet on US President Donald Trump's push for a ceasefire in the war. BBC news, April 8

China vows ‘fight to the end’ after Trump threatens extra 50% tariff
China has vowed to “fight to the end” if the US presses ahead with tariff increases, pushing the world’s two largest economies to the brink of a full-blown trade war. In a ratcheting up of tensions, the commerce ministry on Tuesday said it would retaliate further if US President Donald Trump followed through on his threat to levy an additional 50 per cent tariff on Chinese goods. “If the US proceeds with implementing these escalated tariff measures, China will resolutely take countermeasures to safeguard its own rights and interests,” a commerce ministry spokesperson said. “If the US insists on going its own way, China will fight to the end.” The stand-off between Beijing and Washington comes as a wave of so-called ‘reciprocal tariffs’ against dozens of the US’s trading partners are set to take effect on April 9. The measures, along with a universal tariff of 10 per cent announced at Trump’s ‘liberation day’ event last week, have unleashed turmoil across global stock markets and raised the spectre of a global recession. Financial Times, April 8

France pushes retaliation against US tech, Ireland baulks as EU splits over Trump tariffs
Should the European Union target US Big Tech and services in response to President Donald Trump's tariff onslaught? Differences on the key issue were on display on Monday as the EU sought a show of unity on the pushback. The EU's trade commissioner, Maros Sefcovic, said the 27-country bloc was weighing its response to a "paradigm shift of the global trading system" as Trump's sweeping tariffs sent world markets crashing. Heading into their first talks since Trump ordered 20 percent tariffs on the bloc's imports, EU trade ministers all agreed: Brussels must negotiate with Washington to avoid a damaging trade war. But the bloc has already vowed strong countermeasures should negotiations with Trump's team fall short - and ministers hoped on Monday to narrow their differences over what that response could entail. France came out swinging before the talks in Luxembourg, urging the EU not to rule out an "extremely aggressive" trade response to Trump. France 24, April 7

UK: Labour MPs launch campaign for digital IDs to crack down on illegal migration
More than 40 Labour MPs from three influential backbench groups have called on ministers to introduce digital IDs, which they claim would boost productivity in delivering public services and crack down on illegal employment. The open letter - organised by the Rother Valley MP, Jake Richards - has been signed by the co-chairs of the Labour Growth Group, Chris Curtis and Lola McEvoy, as well as Jo White, who convenes the Labour Red Wall Group. Other signatories include Dan Carden and Jonathan Brash, members of the Blue Labour group of socially conservative MPs. The letter, which has been shared with the Home Office, Cabinet Office and Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, has also been signed by some of the most prominent names in the 2024 intake, including MPs Polly Billington, Jess Asato, Mike Tapp, Joe Powell and Emily Darlington. The letter called on the government to revive the idea of ID cards - a controversial policy proposal during Tony Blair’s era - but said digital IDs were the right route for the modern economy. It said it would mean citizens could “engage with the state more seamlessly”, including booking GP appointments, renewing passports or paying tax. The Guardian, April 8

Philip Green loses challenge to parliamentary privilege at ECHR
The European Court of Human Rights has rejected a legal challenge by Sir Philip Green to restrict the ability of MPs and peers to name individuals protected by court injunctions using parliamentary privilege. The retail tycoon launched the case after he was named in the House of Lords in 2018 as the businessman behind sexual misconduct allegations. At the time, Green had secured an injunction preventing his identity from being published. His lawyers argued that the UK, as a member of the ECHR, is obliged to ensure that parliamentary privilege is not used to circumvent court orders. Eight judges in Strasbourg ruled in a unanimous decision that the right to privacy under Article 8 of the convention had not been violated. A majority of the judges also found that Green’s complaints brought under Article 6, the right to a fair hearing, and Article 13, the right to an effective remedy, were “inadmissible”. Lord Hain, who used parliamentary privilege to name Green, called his case a “barefaced attempt to suppress” democratic protections. The Times, April 8