Over a quarter of 2019, the industrial control king participated in several exhibitions and chatted with automation manufacturers about the market performance in 2019. I don't know whether it is subconsciously choosing to hear the good news or communicating the probability problem. Most of the manufacturers asked by the industrial control king expressed their confidence in the market in 2019. From the current point of view, their performance did not continue the downward trend in the second half of 2018. With the arrival of spring, the company's business has recovered. Although the first quarter financial reports of each company have not yet been announced, Gongkong Jun, through Yingwei's financial situation, summarized and compared the earnings of automation manufacturers in the first quarter of 2019 and the past two years.
GE
In 2018, GE suffered a loss of approximately US$22.4 billion, and has been losing money for two consecutive years. Last year, GE launched a non-internally selected CEO, whose main focus is to streamline the route. In the fourth quarter, GE's revenue was 33.3 billion U.S. dollars, and its net income turned from negative to positive, which far exceeded market analysts’ expectations. As soon as the beginning of 2019, GE's total revenue is forecast to decline, and it is not yet known how its net profit will perform. However, from the point of view of net profit alone, if the reversion in the fourth quarter of 2018 can be continued, the new CEO is expected to lead GE out of the "famine years" of consecutive losses.
Siemens
Despite the decline in Siemens' revenue growth in 2018, the first three months of 2019 have maintained growth compared to 2018, which is a good start for 2019. Based on the comprehensive performance of Siemens in the previous two years, this year is expected to maintain strong growth. It is reported that transportation and industrial digitalization, as Siemens' main transformation direction, is bringing considerable order growth to Siemens.
Mitsubishi
Mitsubishi Electric's revenue is expected to show another negative growth in the first three months of 2019. It can be seen that the fit of Mitsubishi Electric's revenue and the changes in the Chinese automation market is still very high. It is reported that Mitsubishi Electric has announced that it will achieve a goal of over 8% of its operating profit by 2020. And its better-performing net income in fiscal year 2018 accounted for 6% of total income.
ABB
But from the perspective of revenue, ABB has fallen sharply since the second half of last year. However, the reason behind this is mainly because ABB is streamlining its business, focusing on, streamlining and shaping digital business. In particular, ABB will be more streamlined after selling the “big guy” of the power grid business to Hitachi last year. From the order point of view, ABB maintained a good growth in 2018. It is reported that the potential market size of ABB's electrical business unit, industrial automation business unit, motion control business unit, robotics and discrete automation business unit will continue to grow at a rate of 3.5-4% per year in the future.
Emerson
Unlike other automation companies that maintain steady growth in revenue, Emerson's growth last year was still very significant. The first quarter of 2019 continued the growth trend of last year, with a substantial increase year-on-year. It is reported that its growth is mainly due to strong demand for maintenance and repair (MRO) activities and brownfield investment activities focused on expanding and optimizing existing facilities. In addition, at the beginning of the 2019 new fiscal year, Emerson officially completed the acquisition of AE Valve and General Electric Intelligent Platform.
Infineon
According to data for the 2018 fiscal year published on Infineon’s official website, Infineon’s operating profit was 1.353 billion euros, with a profit margin of 17.8%. Due to seasonal reasons, the company expects a decline in the first quarter of fiscal year 2019. However, from a practical point of view, it increased by nearly 3% compared to last year. In the first three months of 2019, the growth rate was greater than that in the first quarter. Slow, but still maintained a good performance.
Delta
Although Delta has gone through the painful period of organizational adjustment, it still maintained good growth in fiscal year 2018. Especially the 5% growth value of the automation business is worthy of recognition. Regardless of whether it is the 2019 full year forecast or the first quarter forecast, Delta has expressed confidence that it can maintain growth.
Conclusion
Judging from the earnings announced by various companies, the industrial control king objectively said that the market has indeed shown signs of recovery. Moreover, according to the forecast data published by various companies in the past, the actual data often exceeds expectations, so the automation market in 2019 is still worth looking forward to!
