"We are very happy with the first and second quarters of this year", said Bob Simpson, head of the plastics machinery division at Milacron (Cincinnati, Ohio / USA; www.milacron.com). "The third quarter of 2007 has also started well – and that's across all the business groups," he added. So far, so good. Although the report for Q2 has not yet been published, it is safe to say that although business in the first three months of 2007 was better than in the same period of the previous year, it was still not good enough. With a loss of USD 10.8m, there is little reason for any typical American exuberance. Restructuring costs – for example one-off effects – accounted for USD 2.4m of this figure, but at the end of the day, the operational business still made a loss of USD 8.4m, which, compared with Q1 2006, (a loss of USD 9.6m and USD 600,000 of one-off expenses) represents an improvement of a mere USD 600,000.

Things are looking quite good for the blow moulding machine activities of Uniloy Milacron (Germany: Grossbeeren; www.uniloymilacron.com). Guido Re, who is responsible for this division, says production is running at full capacity. In his report, Simpson also picked out this division as being a future growth driver. It accounts for around 15% or USD 105m of total machine sales and has a workforce of about 400.

Following the Cincinnati deal with SMS, Extrusion is also back in Europe again. Vice President Dave Bertke sees a bright ray of hope in the wood plastic composites (WPC) sector, for example, where twin-screw extruders designed specifically for this application are going very well, not only in the United States, but particularly also in China. The demonstration machine for the Shanghai pilot plant was sold before it could even begin service there. Bertke estimates that the US market alone will be worth USD 3.5 bn in 2009, and the European market around USD 150m. The production of WPC is being boosted by pressure from the waste product pipeline from the timber, cotton and rice industries. Milacron has already installed 280 machines of this kind throughout the world. In an initial step back to the European continent, a service and spare parts unit has now been set up at Uniloy's site in Magenta / Italy. This is to be followed by a small assembly line, for example for transmissions, said Bertke, but not within the next twelve months.

The injection moulding machine segment remains the company's big worry. Whereas the US business is moving sluggishly because of the declining demand, the new boss at Ferromatik Milacron (Malterdingen / Germany; www.ferromatik.com), Guy Moilliet, sees a ray of light on the horizon in Europe. The years of stagnation, even decline, are being followed for the first time by growth again, especially with difficult applications such as thin-wall injection moulding for packaging and multi-cavity moulding. Ferromatik is also concentrating on multiple technology such as four-colour applications. The aim, said Moilliet, is to get the Malterdingen plant with its 500 employees working at an expanded capacity again.

For the time being, however, the employees will be asked to work longer hours. The idea is to increase the weekly working hours from 35 to 40 without raising pay rates in return – or at least not in full. The employee representatives are preparing for a fight. The management is attempting to justify the proposal among other things with the shortage of specialist staff – and is even considering leaving the "Südwestmetall" employee association in order to push the arrangement through. "We are riding on the wave of a booming economy," said Moilliet, "but with just 35 hours a week, we won't be staying there much longer." His aim is to achieve one third of sales – which, for 2006, and for several years in the past, is put at "around EUR 100m" – with applications, one third with service, and one third with machine manufacturing.