What can the Heavy Equipment industry tell us about trends? In today's podcast, we talk with Louis Fernandez, an expert in the heavy machinery industry with years of helping companies find expense-side savings from the operations of a company. We draw from his expertise in the industry to learn more about how important heavy machines are to the economy and how they are integral to the support of emerging trends. We also delved into the realm of 'operational efficiency' - a pillar of the 'value delivery' side of the equation, and are reminded of the usefulness of this as part of running the business but also bringing to light the utmost importance of revenue growth for long term success.

Economists often use statistics like construction spending and heavy equipment sales to help them predict the state of the economy; as of today, many heavy equipment stocks are rallying, signals opposite to the general economic indicators of an impending recession. How can we look at trends to predict large economic events? Well, if we look at the top trends creating the most momentum in the market: AI, the environment, demographics, mobility, etc. we can see that each of them will require some level of moving earth around. \

For example, AI needs more computing farms, which need buildings erected to hold the computers: needing heavy equipment; "the environment" is driving the growth of electric cars, which need raw materials to create the batteries: needing heavy equipment;  demographics drive where people are living, which need housing: needing heavy equipment. And so forth...

We also explore how those top trends are also driving the direction of the heavy machinery industry as well. For instance, mining was among the first industries to adopt autonomous and electric vehicles for their heavy earth moving machines.

So, by more deeply understanding trends and how they are vastly interconnected to the rest of the economy, we can see that the simplistic economic indicators of heavy machinery or the length of woman's skirt (known as the "hemline index"), may not always hold true to their history. We now need to consider how trends 'work together' to provide a blueprint for your economic success. In the end, we see that trends will always drive the economy and all industries, heavy equipment included, will be driven by them and might even help move them....

‍

Thinking Points

• How can we look at trends to predict large economic events?
  
• What interrelated trends will drive the growth of your business?
• Are you only focused on cutting cost or are you focused on growing your revenue?

‍