In 2023, the Italian capital goods manufacturing industry marks a new turnover record, driven by exports which also reach a level never reached before. 2024 will instead mark a slight decline, thus interrupting the positive trend recorded starting from 2021.
This is essentially what emerges from the surveys just carried out by the FEDERMACCHINE Statistics Group, the federation of capital goods manufacturing companies.
According to preliminary estimates, in 2023, the turnover of the Italian industry in the sector grew to 56.935 million euros, 2,8% more than in 2022. The overall result was determined by the export growth of 5,1%. , at 37.426 million euros.
Deliveries on the domestic market stopped at 19.509 million euros, -1,5% compared to the previous year, affected by the reduction in domestic consumption of machinery which, after years of great expansion, recorded a slight reduction, falling to 31.496 million euros (-0,8%).
2024 appears more uncertain: turnover is expected to decline by -1,2%, to 56.257 million euros. The final result will be affected by the reduction in deliveries by Italian manufacturers, down by -4,6%, to 18.611 million euros. Exports, however, will remain almost stationary at 37.646 million euros (+0,6%).
Bruno Bettelli, president of FEDERMACCHINE, commented: “the Italian capital goods industry seems to have lost the post-pandemic momentum. After the record results recorded until last year, 2023, although still positive, shows the first signs of weakness in the Italian market in the face of still lively activity on foreign markets".
“2024 opens for us with uncertainty on both the domestic and international markets. The geopolitical scenario of great instability, both on the European and Middle Eastern fronts, only adds to the situationicare things, producing an effect of partial freezing of the demand for capital goods. Of course, the slowdown does not occur with the same timing nor with the same intensity for all the sectors controlled by FEDERMACCHINE but this trend is common to the entire world of capital goods".
“For a sector like the machinery sector, which generates more than half of its turnover through exports, internationalization activity is fundamental. Beyond the initiatives of individual associations on markets of specific interest, FEDERMACCHINE together with Confindustria and Sace, in collaboration with ICE-Agenzia, is planning an event for the end of January in Ho Chi Minh City to present the peculiarities of the sector in which institutions representing the two countries, Vietnamese and Italian users with branches and production sites in Vietnam will participate".
“Looking at Italy - added the president of FEDERMACCHINE - it is clear that the halving of the rate for the 4.0 tax credit for purchases of new machinery, which dropped to 2023% in 20, has had an impact on our sales and is equally it is clear that in these last months of the year customers have slowed down their investments while waiting to know what measures will be available in 2024.”
“We know that Italian factories are updating their machinery fleet but in the country's production plants, especially in SMEs, even 20-30 year old machinery is still in operation. We must be able to facilitate the replacement of obsolete technologies by all companies, even the smallest ones, which have more limited economic resources. Only in this way will we be able to ensure the improvement of the competitiveness of Made in Italy".
“All this leads us to say that it would probably be useful to provide a series of structural measures, starting with the 4.0 tax credit for investments in new machinery. In this way manufacturing companies could planicamanage their purchases of production technology with greater tranquility and over longer periods, freeing themselves from the deadlines linked to the annuality of the budget law. On the other hand, we hope that, given the current (substantial) inertia of the Fed and the ECB, interest rates on money will begin to fall as early as the first quarter of the coming year, thus relieving users who intend to invest in new machinery”.
“We are then waiting to understand how the resources allocated to the Transition Plan 5.0 and financed by the Re-power EU fund can be used: the idea of linking incentives for the purchase of new machinery to the theme of green manufacturing and digitalisation and of providing measures to training. But it must be clear, from the first months of the new year, what the actual measures available to companies will be".
“For us, staff represents the keystone with which to ensure continuity in our business activity. For this reason, training incentive measures are very well received by companies operating in the technology field: it is necessary to invest in training and updating of employees already employed in the company, also in light of the innovation challenges, not only digital, that await us in the next future".
“And then – concluded Bruno Bettelli – there is the problem of finding young resources, a serious topic that we discuss more and more frequently. From young, prepared and motivated people, we can draw interesting ideas for the development of our business both on a strategic and innovation level. The demographic decline together with the attraction exerted by foreign countries towards our brightest young people may worsen, starting in the next few years, an already complete situationicata."
“Organisations like FEDERMACCHINE and individual associations, each with their own specificities, can do a lot in this sense by developing actions to promote the sector at universities, ITS, technical institutes, in the areas with the greatest concentration of companies in the sector and with timely initiatives to bring the world of young people closer to this industry which is one of the flagships of Made in Italy in the world".
