Editor's Comment: 10 predictions for 2010

There is a fine tradition in the media that as the year draws to a close, editors should make a series of rash predictions about the coming 12 months. Some will sound plausible, but never come to pass, some will be provocative and stir debate, but only in extreme circumstances will they actually turn out to be true. So for what it's worth, here in no particular order are my 10 predictions for 2010.

1. At least one, and maybe as many as five of the world's largest 50 construction equipment manufacturers will be acquired, broken-up, forced to sell-off a major division, be merged or in some way change ownership. This may include one or two of the top 10.
2. The companies doing the acquiring will be predominately Chinese equipment manufacturers.
3. The largest construction contractor in the world according to iC's league table in the July-August 2010 edition will be a Chinese company.
4. Depressingly, corruption and anti-competitive behaviour will continue to fill our news pages.
5. Visitor numbers for April's Bauma exhibition in Munich will once again break the 0.5 million-mark. The event will be a psychological turning point for the global construction equipment industry.
6. Construction markets in Europe and North America may return to growth by the end of the year, while Brazil, China and India will go from strength to strength.
7. Over the course of the year, more than 1000 news stories will be added to the construction section of our website, khl.com.
8. Russian and UK officials will claim repeatedly that preparations for the 2012 Olympics and 2014 Winter Olympics are on schedule. They will probably be telling the truth, but no-one in the mainstream media will believe them
9. Hybrid powered construction machines will become more widely available - certainly contractors in Europe and the US will be buying them besides today's existing customers in Asia.
10. By this time next year, whatever country of the world or sector of the construction industry you operate in, business will be better than it is today.

Whenever I write a list like this, I look back on it and feel that my years of reporting on this industry have helped me produce a credible and likely set of predictions. Unfortunately, my years of reporting on this industry also tell me that I am invariably wrong about some, if not all of my predictions.

I have hedged my bets a little, and if I look back on this list at the end of 2010, I'm confident of a score of five out of 10. But the world is an unpredictable place, and what seems like a certainty today can evaporate very quickly.

Still, I stand by prediction no. 10. It has been a brutal year for the global industry, but I believe the worst has passed, and 2010 will see business gradually get better.